Turbo Crashes the Internet
by ERiN OPPEL
Summary: When a catastrophic event threatens Turbo's home, he journeys to the Internet in search of the part needed to save it. However, the real test comes from his internal battles, the outcome of which will ultimately determine where he belongs.
1. Wreckquiem for a Dream

**You know what would've made **_**Ralph Breaks the Internet**_** better? If Turbo was in it. So here's the movie rewrite you didn't know you wanted, as well as the next (final?) installment in a fanfic series no one asked for! Before you start, please read my previous stories **_**Turbo Takes the Throne, Torque-it Turbo, **_**and **_**Turbo: Legacy**_** if you haven't already. Don't worry, they're short and can collectively be read in half an hour. Enjoy!**

**PS: I know I said I wasn't gonna make another sequel, but the ending of this movie left me with an opportunity to give Turbo a "proper" ending.**

* * *

Turbo Crashes the Internet

_By ERiN OPPEL_

* * *

Chapter 1: Wreckquiem for a Dream

Blood pounded in his ears as Turbo charged through Game Central Station, panting with each stride. He kept his yellow eyes alert and did his best to avoid knocking into any Arcadians. "Out of the way, this is an emergency!"

Characters that saw or heard him coming were quick to leap out of his path; those that weren't fast enough got spun around.

His destination was in sight. Turbo turned on his heels and flew through the game's terminal without stopping for the Surge Protector.

A dark expanse with multicolored walls greeted him but he didn't have time to sight-see. Turbo found the irregular trails and followed alongside them until he passed a yellow warning sign. He skidded to a slow jog before he got too close to the danger zone and took a few cautious steps forward to get a better look.

And promptly burst out laughing.

"It's not funny!" Vanellope yelled, though her words were somewhat mispronounced due to her teeth being clenched together.

Also frozen in place beside her, Wreck-it Ralph demanded, "Hurry and fix it!"

But the embarrassing sight of Ralph and Vanellope paralyzed and glitching on their light cycles was too much and Turbo keeled over. "I'm sorry… I… I can't… help it!" he gasped between laughter, kicking his feet.

"TURBO!"

* * *

"Anytime, Tron!" Turbo waved before departing from the now virus-free game. His journey back into Game Central Station was much more leisurely. Some characters acknowledged him for repairing _Tron_, as he was the only one in the arcade skilled enough to manipulate code. It was something of a job he had, once he started to gain more trust. He was proud to have saved several games that would have otherwise been unplugged. Even so, not everyone accepted his presence.

He didn't really mind; he still had his friends and was content with living in _Sugar Rush._ The only thing that bugged him was that it had been six years since his unofficial acceptance into the arcade, and he _still_ wasn't allowed to be part of the game proper. Every time he brought it up with Vanellope she'd just tell him she was still "possibly considering it". Eventually he just gave up, figuring she wasn't ever planning on letting him be a racer.

Turbo guessed he couldn't complain, though. For now he was fine, and the thought of his life being better someday was a nice dream to think about. Plus, Ralph and Vanellope being trapped in the _Tron_ virus made his day.

A shadow casted over the power bar, interrupting the sunrise. Mr. Litwak's voice could be heard, "All right, let's get you plugged in."

An empty terminal suddenly came to life. The LED display above it started to load as the metal prongs of a plug were sliding slowly into place.

"That's a plug-in alert!" Vanellope exclaimed unnecessarily.

Everyone immediately rushed over to the aforementioned terminal, some bumping into Turbo on their way there.

"Hey, watch it!" Turbo rubbed his shoulder with eyes narrowed at the crowd gawking at the sign. "You'd think they'd never seen a new game being plugged in before," he mumbled. Then again, it had been a long time since Litwak had got one. The arcade instead had been losing more games in recent years, despite Turbo's maintenance. Perhaps arcades were becoming a dying breed. Curiosity getting the best of him, he hurried over and made his way to the front, next to Felix and Ralph with Vanellope on his shoulder.

"Please be a racing game," the little girl was saying.

It wasn't until she mentioned it that Turbo immediately hoped it wasn't. Though he would never repeat his past mistake, he dreaded the idea of _Sugar Rush_ losing its popularity to a newer game, which would only decrease his chance of becoming playable. And he doubted the new one would let him join after doing a background check.

Finally the plug was in place and the display read: WI-FI.

Ralph squinted and pronounced, "Whiffy? Or is it Wifey?" He shrugged. "Well, it's either whiffleball, or an arranged marriage game."

Sonic spoke up matter-of-factly, "It's actually pronounced 'why-fye', Ralph."

"Yeah, that's what I said."

The blue hedgehog went on, "And Wi-Fi is the Internet! Which is an online community where human beings go to shop, play games, and socialize." His expression suddenly darkened. "Among… other things…"

Turbo asked, "What other things?" He wasn't prepared for Sonic to start shaking him by the shoulders though.

"You don't want to know!" Sonic shouted in his face while one of his eyes twitched. "Just whatever you do, stay away from DeviantArt!"

"Whoa, Sonic, how do you know all this?" Ralph inquired.

Turbo pried Sonic's hands off him and the hedgehog answered, "I have ears, Ralph. When people talk, I listen." He stared a thousand miles off into the distance. "But sometimes I wish I didn't…"

"Sonic's right." Surge Protector appeared in front of the terminal. "That sign up there says Wi-Fi. What it should say is 'Die-Fi'. That's a little humour there," he joked dryly, sticking caution tape across the entrance. "But seriously, the Internet is nothing to laugh at. It is new, it is different, and therefore we should fear it. So keep out, for Pete's sake, and get to work. The arcade's about to open."

Turbo wasn't too disappointed. While he was curious about what the Internet games were like, it didn't seem worth the risk, judging by Sonic's reaction. At least it hadn't been a racing game. Everything seemed to go back to normal as everyone returned to their own lives. Turbo sighed, figuring he should get back to his. "I'll be in _Sugar Rush_," he said to Ralph and Vanellope while they continued to stare at the Wi-Fi terminal. Without waiting for a response he turned around, and nearly bumped into Mario.

"What's-a this?" the plumber asked, gesturing to the new terminal. "Some type-a new game?"

Turbo huffed in annoyance. "It's the Internet, Mario. You didn't make it on time again."

Sonic, apparently back to his usual self, taunted from afar, "You're too slow!" Then he dashed off.

Mario glared after the hedgehog and muttered something possibly rude in Italian.

Turbo left the scene and started to head back to his game. The candy train was empty, so he took a seat at the front. The train waited a few seconds in case anyone else should board, but when no one did it rang its bell and departed for _Sugar Rush_.

The bright candy-coated world opened up as the train came to a stop. Turbo disembarked and made his way to his new garage, which he had built (this time with help) a couple years ago on Peppermint Ridge. It was much closer to civilization than his last place and not too far from his Turbo Time track and Strawberry Fields where his best friend Taffyta lived. He never missed one of her races, and his new home made watching them easier.

The sound of candy karts roared in the distance as Turbo walked along the track. Correction: one of the _new tracks_. He grimaced, remembering how Vanellope was able to unlock two new tracks during her brief stint as president when he never even knew that was possible in all his time as king. Sure, he was able to race on them after hours, but it would've been nice to try them while he was still playable.

Speaking of the glitch, she zoomed right up beside him in her kart and slammed on the brakes, showering him with chocolate dirt. "Hey, Turbo! I got something to tell you back at the castle!"

He coughed and brushed the dust off his jumpsuit. Then he raised a puzzled brow at her. "You can't tell me now, right here?"

"Castle! Now!" she ordered sharply, then tore off before Turbo could protest.

The white racer sighed and changed direction. "What does she want this time?"

* * *

Vanellope sat very regally in her kart in front of her throne. Or at least she tried to. It was still hard for Turbo to take her fail-tastic kart seriously. Something was different about her, though. Normally when she summoned him Vanellope was always snarky or condescending. But this time when she saw Turbo enter the throne room she seemed much more friendly. It made him uncomfortable.

Turbo opened his mouth to comment on that, but Vanellope silenced him with a wave of her scepter.

"Ah-bup-bup-bup! Remember, I talk first," she stated with a grin, making Turbo roll his eyes. "Over the past six years you've made a lot of progress. I never thought I'd get to the point where I actually start trusting you. Not to mention that after hours you look like a pretty good racer. Which made me remember that possible request from a while back."

Turbo lit up hopefully. "Wait, are you saying that you're gonna move on from possibly considering my request to considering it?"

"Nope!"

All his hope vanished. "Oh."

"I'm gonna go straight to granting it!"

And then it came back just as quickly. "Really?"

"Yep! Well, there's not enough time right now, but first thing tonight I'm gonna fully integrate your code so that you can be a playable racer!"

Turbo couldn't believe his ears. This was almost too good to be true! Wait, what if it _was_ too good to be true? He stared at her warily and accused, "This is a trick, isn't it? You plan to glitch my car? Turn me into a recolor? Delete my code in my sleep?"

"What? No!" Vanellope frowned. "Would I lie to you?"

Turbo lowered his eyelids in disapproval.

Vanellope amended, "Ok, sure, but this time I really mean it. You'd be a good playable character. I honestly believe you'll bring something new to the track."

Turbo smiled thoughtfully. That wasn't a compliment he'd heard before. But still, he had to be sure. "So that's it? After six years of not interfering with the game, you're just gonna make me a racer?"

"Yeah, you're getting just what you wanted! Isn't that great? I call it a win-win!"

"Ok, I'm not sure how it'll benefit you on your end, but hey, not complaining!" And here he thought she was miffed that he laughed at her earlier. Turbo's grin became even wider and he bounced excitedly on his toes. "Turbo-tastic! I'm gonna be a racer! Again!"

Vanellope squealed, "I know! I'm so happy! Er, for you!" She cleared her throat. "Sorry, happiness is contagious. Oh look, a quarter alert!"

"I didn't hear any-"

"Quarter alert!" the announcer cheerfully notified.

Vanellope started her kart. "Gotta go! Mark my words, you're gonna be on the roster tomorrow!" With that she sped out of her throne room.

Turbo continued to celebrate on his own. "This is it! It's finally happening!" he cheered, leaping jubilantly around the room. Noticing Sour Bill by the door, he said, "Sour Bill, guess what? I'm gonna be a racer!"

The green ball's droopy eyes turned to him. "I know. I was here the whole time."

Turbo skipped out of the room, meeting up with Wynnchel and Duncan. "Hey guys! I'm gonna be a racer!" He bounded down the hall singing, "_S-U-G-A-R, jump into your racing car, say Sugar Rush! Sugar Rush!_"

"Huh, just when you think you know someone," commented Duncan, watching him leave.

As he passed several candy citizens on their way to the default track, Turbo happily let them know about his future status. He could see the other racers lining up at the start in the distance and knew the game was about to begin. He'd have to tell Taffyta the good news later. For now, he went over to his garage.

The ridge was located high enough where he got a good view of each of the tracks but not visible from the gamer's perspective. After jumping into his Turbomobile, he grabbed a lollipop from his pocket to snack on and leaned back. Soon, the race began. As Turbo so often did, he imagined himself racing with them, but now with a lot more meaning since he knew he would truly be with them tomorrow.

Vanellope was the chosen avatar, as usual. Most gamers selected her for her glitching ability, which was so broken that it made her win pretty much all the time. As a result, some races became rather boring and often left Taffyta in a bad mood.

This race seemed no different. Vanellope had already pulled way ahead into the lead and was close to the finish line.

Turbo grumbled in disappointment and tossed away his finished lollipop stick. "Oh well. I'll remind her who's the greatest racer tomorrow." Then he almost felt guilty. Vanellope was the one who was giving him another chance and he never even thanked her for it. But then he remembered all the suffering _she_ put him through and he didn't feel so bad.

Movement beside the track caught his eye and he saw a path that he never noticed before. The one clearing the rubble away was none other than Wreck-it Ralph. Turbo bolted up with his hands on the hood of his car. "Ralph?!" he cried in alarm. "What are you doing?! Ralph! Stop!"

Worse yet, Vanellope took a detour right onto the track Ralph made, apparently against the player's control.

"Vanellope, you idiot! You can play on the new track later! _After_ you make me a racer!"

Suddenly he heard more commotion from the gamers outside. It sounded like the girl playing as Vanellope was really struggling to control her. Panic started to flood through Turbo. If there was one rule he always stuck to, it was never, _ever_ fight the gamer. No matter how many walls they drove you into.

A loud snap rumbled throughout the console and Turbo flinched. At the same moment Vanellope crashed her car, putting her out of the race. Just as he feared, something had gone wrong. Unable to wait another second, Turbo started his car and drove towards the track.

He parked behind the stands and ran over to where Ralph, Vanellope, and the other racers were gathered, but made sure he stayed out of view of the live camera.

"Mr. Litwak, the Vanellope racer wasn't working," the gamer was saying apologetically, "and I think maybe I turned the wheel too hard. I'm really sorry."

The arcade owner said, "Oh, it's ok, Swati. I think I can get it back on there pretty easily." He tried sticking the wheel onto the console.

"What did you do, Ralph?" Taffyta hissed with her arms crossed.

Ralph denied, "I didn't do anything, _Taffyta_."

Turbo leaned closer to keep his voice low. "Don't talk to her that way, I saw you making that track!" he defended, then glared at Vanellope. "And don't get me started on you!"

The princess scoffed, but before she could reply they heard another snap, this time from the steering wheel being accidentally broken in half.

Ralph remained calm. "Ok, it's still not a problem. He'll just order a new part."

"Well, I'd order a new part," said Litwak, standing back with a grim look, "but the company that made _Sugar Rush_ went out of business years ago."

"Since when?!" Turbo gasped, then Ralph's giant hand covered his face and he remembered he was supposed to be quiet.

Another gamer spoke up, "I could try to find them on the Internet."

Mr. Litwak looked doubtful. "Good luck. You're only gonna be looking for a needle in a—"

"I got one! On eBay!" Swati showed her phone to Mr. Litwak.

He squinted at the small screen. "Are you kidding me? $200? That's more than this game makes in a year! I hate to say it, but my salvage guys are coming on Friday. It might be time to sell _Sugar Rush_ for parts."

Turbo went cold from the shock. For a moment time slowed and echoes of Litwak's words spun in his head, trying to process what was happening. It felt like a nightmare, but no matter how hard he tried he couldn't wake up.

It wasn't until Ralph spoke that he finally snapped out of it. "Litwak's gonna unplug the game!"

At once everyone started to run for the exit in panic. Reacting on instinct, Turbo grabbed Taffyta's hand and made a dash for his car. "We gotta get out of here!" He practically shoved her onto the back while he jumped in the seat. "Hang on!" he said, flooring the pedal.

Taffyta yelped from the sudden acceleration but she kept her grip. "Hurry, Turbo!"

Colors blurred together and the frightful screams of fleeing _Sugar Rush_ residents became like one sound as Turbo expertly weaved through the crowds. All he could think about was escaping. Escape before the game gets unplugged. Escape before your code gets imprisoned forever. Escape and return to _Turbo Time_. He blinked quickly, suddenly unsure what was a flashback and what was now.

_No, focus, Turbo,_ he mentally commanded, eyes narrowing in concentration. They were coming up to the top of the Rainbow Bridge. The candy train had been crushed under the stampede of citizens that had come before them, leaving Turbo with no choice but to use the remains as a ramp to launch his car into the tunnel.

Sparks flew from the tires. Turbo swerved to avoid mowing down other characters. After what seemed like an eternity, light poured into the tunnel as they neared Game Central Station, but the plug was almost disconnected.

Escape. Escape. Escape.

With one last boost, Turbo flew out of the terminal. He may have hit the Surge Protector on his way in, but his mind was more relieved at the fact that he made it. Turbo braked and turned to the side, nearly tipping his car over. He stayed sitting down with his hands keeping a death grip on the wheel. _I'm alive. I made it. I'm alive,_ he repeated to himself, trying to calm his racing heart. He glanced over his shoulder to make sure Taffyta was ok.

Thankfully she had made it as well, despite her hair being a little frazzled. She let go of his car and shared a worried gaze with him before looking back at the terminal.

The plug was removed just as the last of the citizens crossed through, and the LED screen went dark.

"We're homeless!" yelled Wynnchel. He and Duncan started to sob as they hugged each other.

More cries echoed similar sentiments. Homelessness was a feeling Turbo knew all too well. Memories of the previous time flashed in his mind and soon he realized he was hyperventilating. "No… No, no, NO, IT'S HAPPENING AGAIN!" he screamed, holding himself tight. "I can't go back in the walls! I just can't!"

Nearby crying brought Turbo to his senses; Taffyta had lost her composure and wept pitifully. Realizing he needed to be strong for her, Turbo got out of his car and hugged her soothingly. "Don't worry, Taffyta. Everything is going to be all right."

She sniffed, her head still buried in his chest. "You r-really think s-so?"

Turbo frowned. There was no point in lying to her; she wouldn't believe him anyway. "No," he answered miserably.

Everything he'd worked for… The happy life he'd earned… His dream of becoming a real racer again…

Gone.

* * *

**I'm gonna try to stick as close to the movie as possible, but as you can see some dialogue will be added/changed. I know it's a little rusty, so please tell me what you liked or if anything could be improved! However, flames will not be tolerated. Save your wangst for a therapist.**


	2. Out of the Comfort Zone

**I should mention that I've only seen the movie twice, read the transcript, and watched Youtube clips, so if I remember details wrong just pretend that's how it is.**

* * *

Chapter 2: Out of the Comfort Zone

Until the arcade closed, the _Sugar Rush_ citizens had to wait in Game Central Station, where there was barely enough room for all of them. The chorus of sobs gradually died down as the initial shock of the unplugging passed, which Turbo was thankful for. Nobody else had been there when _Turbo Time_ was unplugged. Nobody mourned with him. At first he thought having so many to sympathize with would make it more bearable; instead it was more depressing. At least everyone had calmed down after a few hours.

Most of the citizens were divided up between the various games that could accommodate so many. The rest were welcome to wait in the Nicelander's penthouse for characters to give them shelter. Out of the goodness of his heart, Ralph personally chose Vanellope and Turbo to stay in _Fix-it Felix Jr._, assuring him that he wouldn't have to make a home in the walls of the power bar. While he was grateful, Turbo was concerned about the other racers that hadn't been adopted yet, so he waited with them in the penthouse for moral support.

Gene, holding his ever-present martini glass, spoke up next, "I suppose that large green olive will fit in nicely with my décor."

Sour Bill corrected in irritation, "I'm a sour ball."

"Well, beggars can't be choosers, can they?" Gene dismissed, stepping towards the door. "Come along, condiment."

"M'kay…" Sour Bill got down from his chair and reluctantly followed him.

_I wonder if that's the last I'll see of him,_ Turbo mused.

"Marvelous!" Felix gestured to the remaining characters. "That just leaves the racers!"

Taffyta took her lollipop out of her mouth and said with a smirk, "We're, like, _adorable_."

"You sure are!" Felix agreed sweetly. He turned to the last of the volunteers. "So, any takers?"

And then there was silence. Nicelanders sipped their tea or shifted awkwardly. Chun-Li pretended her spiked bracelet was a watch and Satine tapped his claws against his china cup while inspecting the ceiling. Everybody made sure to look anywhere but at Felix.

Turbo's heart sank, especially when he saw the racers' crestfallen expressions. If only he had a home he would take them all in.

Felix prompted, "Uh, anyone?"

It was no use. Turbo finally stepped forward and snapped, "What's wrong with all of you?! Satine, come on, I thought you were great with kids!"

The demon-like character shrugged uncomfortably. "I would, but I already got into a lot of trouble with parents back in the 80's…"

"Fine, but what about the rest?"

The others looked a bit ashamed and Felix held out his hands comfortingly. "Now, now, Turbo, I'm sure they have good reasons why they can't adopt them."

"I'll give you the one reason: They hate kids." Turbo crossed his arms sourly. "Prove me wrong."

Felix's forced smile faded as he struggled for words.

Calhoun lowered to her husband's eye level and put a hand on his shoulder. "Felix, I know we've never once talked about having a family before, but-"

The handyman turned to her, grinning broadly and finished, "I know, it feels like the kind of thing you just jump into with both feet and nary a plan!"

Calhoun stood up and announced, "Felix and I will give them sanctuary!"

Cheers erupted from the racers and Turbo relaxed. He never thought he'd ever feel appreciative to Calhoun, but that one moment made her seem less scary. Maybe being married to Felix had mellowed her out.

Surge Protector, who Turbo almost forgot was there with them, said to Felix and Calhoun, "Can I get a quick word with you two?" He went into the next room.

Turbo followed the couple inside, and then Surge looked at him disapprovingly.

"When I said 'you two'-"

"Anything you say to them you can say in front of me," Turbo stated, closing the door behind him. "I am practically family, after all."

"It's just that you're still in the process of getting reintroduced to society, and now with you going through an unplugging for the second time…" Surge grimaced uneasily.

"What, you think I'm gonna snap and go psycho on everyone?" Turbo accused. "I'm fine! I'll just talk about this at my next Bad Anon meeting!"

Surge muttered, "Good to see you're still in therapy."

"_Group _therapy," he corrected. "We all have each other's backs!"

"I'm sure you do. Now, about the racers." Surge looked at Felix and Calhoun. "Are you sure you can handle taking care of them? Those things are basically feral."

Calhoun declared dramatically, "Pardon me, sir, but those youngsters are lambs! Lost, little lambs in need of two kind, caring shepherds!"

At this Turbo cracked up. "You've got to be kidding me! I mean, don't get me wrong, I appreciate you volunteering, but those kids can be downright savage! Take it from me, I looked after them for fifteen years."

"While trying to delete one of them," Surge reminded.

"The point is," Turbo continued, "I don't think your 'kind, caring shepherd' method is gonna work."

Felix shrugged. "How hard can parenting be? You treat the child like your best friend, you give them everything they want, and you just love their little socks off! Right, Tammy?"

"Darn tootin'."

Turbo facepalmed, but before he could say anything else, everyone heard a scream.

Calhoun readied her gun, then she and Felix opened the door.

And saw all the racers playing in chaos. Rancis pushed Minty in a chair; Gloyd, Jubileena and Snowana threw objects around the room; Crumbelina clung to the curtains, and Adorabeezle ran with scissors like a psycho. Everyone was shrieking delightfully.

Turbo smirked at Felix and Calhoun's open mouthed expressions and commented, "Looks like your honeyglow phase is over."

Taffyta hung over the armchair and clicked on the Cybug scanner aimed at a painting. "_Mom_, why does your lame TV have only one channel?" she complained to Calhoun.

"That's my girl," said Turbo proudly. "Well, I'm off to have a long chat with Ralph and Vanellope. Someone's got a lot of explaining to do."

* * *

Finding those two wasn't so hard. He'd heard them talking on top of the penthouse roof, so after taking the elevator Turbo joined them. Whatever conversation they were having died when they saw him arrive.

"Oh, good to see you're taking this well by making pillow forts," he said sarcastically.

"For your information, we were going to make a pigloo," Ralph corrected.

"…That is literally the dumbest thing I've ever heard."

"Coming from the guy who made a Fungeon."

"Hm. Touché." Turbo dropped his cordial pretence. "Now that you're done gossiping, I was hoping you could both explain… _what the heck happened back there?!_"

Ralph held up his hands. "It was an accident, all right?"

"You call that an accident? Vanellope's glitching caused the game to be put out of order! _Which is exactly what I warned about all those years ago!_"

"Hey!" Vanellope retorted, "The gamer was the one who broke the wheel, remember?"

"She blamed it on _you_! That wouldn't have happened if you hadn't bit the hand that controlled you!" Turbo indicted. "You bit the hand!"

"She was just having fun!" argued Ralph.

"And what made you think it was ok to be in another game during daylight hours, constructing a track while a race was going on?"

"I was being a good friend! Vanellope said her game was too predictable and not exciting enough!"

"Not ex…" Turbo shot Vanellope a wide-eyed look, and caught the guilty expression on her face before she looked away. "Wait a minute," he started, his voice rising in anger as he stepped toward her. "You mean to tell me that the only reason you wanted to make me playable was because you were _bored?!"_

The little girl faced him and tried to smile innocently. "Well, maybe, but I did think adding you would've made the game more interesting for everyone."

"I don't know if I should be flattered or insulted." Turbo thought for a second. "No, I'm gonna go with insulted."

Ralph stood up quickly and said to Vanellope, "Whoa, hang on! You never told me you were gonna make Turbo playable!"

"I was planning on it tonight after the arcade closed, but then all this happened…"

"You could've told me this morning after you complained about your game! Then I wouldn't have made that track!"

Now it was Vanellope's turn to be angry. "I only thought of it later! And _you_ could've just waited until after hours to make that track!"

Then all three of their voices were arguing over each other about whose fault it was. It only ended when Surge appeared on the roof with them and said, "Sorry, but could you keep it down? Filling out adoption forms isn't easy with so much noise."

Turbo replied bitterly, more to Ralph and Vanellope, "That's ok. I was just leaving." He stomped over to the door and slammed it shut behind him.

* * *

"Keep 'em coming," mumbled Turbo after downing another mug of root beer. He pushed his empty glass toward Tapper and rested his head in his hand.

The bartender took the glass silently and gave Turbo a pitying look before going to fill more mugs.

Turbo kept his gloomy gaze lowered as he joylessly spun his napkin on the counter, trying to ignore the unfitting jolly piano music playing on loop in the background. He couldn't believe that all this happened because of simple miscommunication. And right before his second chance too. "First stupid Vanellope, then stupid Ralph, and then," he grumbled and let his head fall on the table, "stupid _wheel_." The only consolation he had was that none of this was his fault.

He heard the door swing open but he didn't look up. Someone sat beside him, and judging by the heavy thud in the chair and the smell, it had to be Ralph.

"Hey, listen," the wrecker began gently. "I'm sorry about what happened. I know you must've been pretty excited about being an official part of _Sugar Rush _again."

Turbo sighed and responded cynically, "That's ok. I'm used to disappointment. After all I did I suppose I deserve it."

Ralph's voice became concerned. "Turbo, we talked about this at Bad Anon. You can't keep beating yourself up over your mistakes after you agreed to move on from them."

"You don't get it, do you?" Turbo looked up at him. "How many times have you been happy, only for it to be taken away from you? I didn't even do anything wrong this time, but it's like the universe still hates me."

Ralph frowned and stayed silent for a moment. Then he said, "I do know what that's like. And maybe this whole mess is somehow partially my fault. But I do remember what Zangief once told me. He said 'happiness is a choice'."

Turbo scoffed. "He should write fortune cookies."

"Actually I think he said he got it off a bumper sticker. But the point is, you can choose to be happy no matter what your situation is."

"Hmph." Turbo said nothing more.

Tapper returned with a full mug of root beer for each of them, and the two drank together in silence. Ralph ordered a glass for Vanellope, saying she was supposed to meet him there. Turbo couldn't care less if she showed up or not. He was not in the mood to see her, much less talk to her.

Eventually Ralph seemed to grow impatient and he asked, "Hey Tapper, have you seen-"

"No, Ralph, I have not seen Vanellope," Tapper interjected without looking up from wiping the counter, "not since the last time you asked me 30 seconds ago."

"Sorry, I'm just worried about her. She's glitching like crazy and acting super insecure and—oh, get this. She said being friends with me wasn't enough for her." He waved his hands in astonishment. "Not enough? I'm a great friend! Right?"

Turbo moved Ralph's hand out of his face and remarked, "Now who's acting insecure?" But if that was actually what Vanellope said, he couldn't blame him for worrying.

Tapper filled a few mugs. "Ralph, come on. The kid just lost her game. Give her a break." He then moved on to his other customers.

Someone entered the tavern and Ralph looked up expectantly. "There you-"

But it was Felix who slumped into the seat reserved for Vanellope. It must've been only 20 minutes since Turbo had seen him last, and already the man looked worn out. Those racers were doing a good job.

"Hey, guys," Felix dully greeted.

"Hey, Felix," Ralph acknowledged. "Since when do you drink root beer?"

"Since tonight."

"Yeah, I hear you buddy." He slid a mug to his friend. "Hey, this one was supposed to be for Vanellope, but I guess you can have it. Doesn't look like she's coming."

Felix took it in both hands and stared at it sullenly. "Thanks."

"We were just talking about how everything went south just when our lives were perfect," Turbo filled in.

Felix obviously tried to control his temper. "Mine was too! But hey! Now I'm a father of 15!" He gripped his glass and said through clenched teeth, "Isn't that just a blessing?" Then he rapidly chugged the whole drink. He slammed the mug down and made an incomprehensible sound, "Eeuw-o-boy."

Ralph suddenly lit up. "Wait a minute. What did you just say, Felix?"

He looked confused but repeated, "Uh, isn't that just a blessing?"

"No, that weird sound thing."

"Uh… Eeuw-o-boy?"

Ralph furrowed his brows in concentration and echoed, "Eeuw-o-boy?"

"Eee-o-boy?"

"Eeee-boy?"

Turbo snapped, "It's eBay! You're thinking of eBay!"

"Yeah, that's it!" Ralph smiled at them. "That kid out in the arcade said there was a steering wheel part in the Internet in something called eBay!"

Turbo's resentment started to ebb. "Ralph, are you thinking about going to the Internet and finding that part?"

"Getting that part's the only thing that's gonna fix the game and that's the only thing that's gonna make Vanellope happy again."

The racer finished his drink and stood up with renewed hope. "I'm coming too. Even though it _wasn't_ my fault, I should go to make sure Vanellope keeps her promise to add me to the roster."

Felix added, "And if _Sugar Rush_ is fixed, those lovable scamps living in my house and _destroying my sanity_ will have homes of their own again!"

Then Turbo spotted a problem. "Hang on, Ralph can't leave during work days. Remember what happened the last time he did that?"

Felix gripped his shoulders, perhaps a little too forcefully. "Turbo, this is an important mission. A noble mission! I will cover for him," he decided.

Turbo waited for an explanation, but Felix just grinned without giving them one. He shrugged. "Ok, whatever."

Ralph announced jovially to everyone in the bar, "Drinks on the house, everybody! Felix is paying!"

The customers cheered, and Turbo couldn't help but smile in amusement at Felix's regretful expression as he followed Ralph out the door.

* * *

"You're really going to the Internet?" Taffyta asked, her blue eyes round in awe.

"That's right," Turbo answered. "I'm not gonna give up on our game without a fight!"

She clasped her hands. "Can I go too? The others will be so jealous."

Turbo chuckled and patted her shoulder. "Now what kind of responsible friend would I be if I let any one of you come?"

Crossing her arms, she turned her face away dejectedly. "You said Vanellope is going."

"Yeah, but that's 'cause she needs to learn her lesson, and I don't care if she gets hurt along the way." In response to her pout he added, "Surge might be right about the Internet being a dangerous place. I couldn't live with myself if something were to happen to you."

"But what if something happens to you?" she said all of a sudden, whipping her anxious face back to him. "What if you never come back?"

The thought had crossed his mind, but Turbo refused to dwell on it. He smiled reassuringly. "I came back when everyone thought I was dead, didn't I? I'll always come back."

That seemed to put her at ease, and Taffyta allowed a little smile.

"Besides, I need someone to look after my Turbomobile while I'm gone…"

She gasped in delight and squealed, "Yes! Thank you, Turbo! I'll take good care of her!"

"I know you will."

A disheveled Felix stumbled into the room with Candlehead on his back and paint splotches on his face. "Turbo! Do they ever slow down?" he asked desperately.

"They're just breaking you in," he replied with a subtle wink to Taffyta.

Minty ran in with a loaded paintbrush and said, "Felix, come back! I haven't finished your makeup!"

The handyman cried out and escaped to another room.

"Faster!" Candlehead laughed, gleefully kicking his sides.

Turbo rose from the couch and cracked his back. "Well, it looks like you've got everything under control here, so I'm gonna get going. You can count on me to save _Sugar Rush_!" After giving Taffyta a parting hug, he walked away with a wave. "Stay sweet, Taff!"

"Good luck, Turbo!" Then she went to join the others in their mischief.

Turbo met up with Ralph outside the apartment building and together they went to inform Vanellope, who now settled in Ralph's brick dump, and Turbo couldn't say he exactly pitied her. He scoffed at seeing her attempt to build a kart out of bricks, which collapsed into the pile. "At least I had the sense to bring my kart with me," he said wryly.

Ralph smacked his forehead in realization. "Your kart! Oh, Vanellope, I'm so sorry, I didn't notice you left your kart in your game!"

"Ralph, it's ok!" But her smile was weak. "It's… It's fine. I'll just… make another one."

"Or… you don't have to!" Ralph gestured energetically as he announced, "Start churning butter and put on your church shoes, little sister, 'cause we're about to blast off!"

Turbo wondered if that was supposed to be some kind of code they came up with, until Vanellope asked in confusion, "What are you even talking about?"

The pale racer stated bluntly, "We're going to the Internet."

Vanellope's eyes shone and she jumped up. "What? No way!"

"Yeah, I guess I could've just said that," added Ralph.

The little girl started to bound for the train. "What are we waiting for? Let's go, guys!"

* * *

Just as expected, the Surge Protector stood guard in front of the blocked off entrance to the Internet. His attention was focused on his clipboard, but that wouldn't be enough to get past him unnoticed.

Ralph and Vanellope ran up to him and Ralph started, "Surge! Are we glad to see you! We want to report some malfeasance over by the Whack-a-Mole."

Vanellope added, "Yeah, we saw some undesirables causing a real donnybrook over there!"

Surge adjusted his glasses in determination. "Oh heck no, not on my watch!" He ran off, leaving them to chuckle.

Turbo stopped clinging to Ralph's back and said, "What did I tell ya? I'm an expert at getting past this guy."

"Yeah, yeah, congrats on your plan that anyone could come up with," Vanellope dismissed as she ducked under the caution tape.

As they traversed the tunnel, Turbo wondered what the Internet would be like. Judging by Sonic's description, he imagined it to be massive, larger than any video game map he'd known. Perhaps it looked like a giant Game Central Station, filled with characters from all over the world. Turbo grinned, anticipating the awe he was sure to feel.

Which is why it was incredibly disappointing when they just ended up in a dark, empty room.

Vanellope glanced around. "I gotta admit, I'm underwhelmed."

Aside from them, the only other things in the room were a bunch of odd equipment that looked like they would fit in with _Hero's Duty_. Turbo kicked at some of it and grumbled, "What a rip-off."

Ralph called out, "Hello? Anybody here?" The only response was his own voice bouncing off the walls. "You hear that? Sweet echo!" He yelled louder, intensifying the echoes. Vanellope gleefully joined in.

Turbo was the only one not amused. "Will you two stop it?! We're in the wrong place!"

Vanellope frowned. "What do you mean?"

"This isn't the Internet. Sonic made a mistake." Turbo sighed glumly. "We're not getting that part."

Silence hung over them as realization set in. Then a sudden noise and burst of light made them jump out of their skins as one of the machines came to life. A glowing portal now appeared above a platform.

As they stared, a short character with a square-ish head materialized in front of them and started walking towards the portal.

Ralph jumped back in fear. "That's a gremlin! Stay away, it's a gremlin!"

"How much did you drink?" asked Turbo warily. "That looks nothing like a gremlin at all."

Vanellope squinted and observed, "It looks like a tiny Mr. Litwak."

Indeed, he had the same shirt and glasses as the arcade owner. The diminutive man walked stiltedly up the platform, where a capsule formed around him and he disappeared into the portal.

Vanellope started to follow him. "Come on, I think we have to go this way!"

"Hey, wait for me! Kid, come back!" Ralph tried to catch up, but the girl vanished into the portal before he could reach her. "Wait! Vanellope!" Proximity to the strange passageway caused him to be encapsulated and sucked in as well.

Turbo stared, his shallow breathing the only sound in the room besides the hum from the portal. _Should I go? What if it leads somewhere else? What if I really do never get back?_ But turning around would do him no good either. After all, he promised the racers he'd bring the part. There was no way he could let them down without even trying. And if this did lead to the Internet, there was NO WAY he'd let Ralph and Vanellope get all the credit.

So after taking a deep breath, Turbo ran up the platform, got in a capsule, and shot through the portal.

* * *

**How IS Felix exactly covering for Ralph? The movie does a great job of glossing over important plot points.**


	3. What They Bought on eBay

**I reference a couple of songs in this chapter. See if you can find them!**

* * *

Chapter 3: What They Bought on eBay

He was flying.

The ride started when Turbo was beamed from the tiny black box to a set of cables across the arcade. Then he was taken through copper wires at breakneck speeds, much faster than he had ever gone before. At first he tensed nervously, but the tickling sensation in his stomach grew stronger and he couldn't help but laugh. So he pretended he was racing along some unexplored track and found himself liking the experience.

A world of colour and light suddenly opened up to him. His traveling slowed, and he stared in amazement at what was before him.

Humans, or rather, representations of humans like the square-headed Mr. Litwak from before, moved in the same direction in their own capsules. All around as far as his eyes could see were different-shaped buildings with their bright logos identifying them. This _had_ to be the Internet.

Turbo tried to locate eBay, but all of a sudden he dropped toward a large, circular landing pad, screaming. Seeing Ralph and Vanellope already there and coming up fast, he yelled, "CATCH ME CATCH ME CATCH ME!" But his capsule rapidly slowed before he could hit the ground and released him gently. "Oh." He ignored Vanellope snickering at him.

"Guys, I don't think we're at Litwak's anymore," Ralph remarked.

Vanellope spun around in wonder. "We most certainly are not, friendo. We're in the Internet!" She grabbed his hand and Turbo's collar and started running off. "Come on, guys!"

Turbo yanked his collar away from her and sneered, "I can keep up just fine." He was starting to wish they hadn't brought Vanellope along. There was no way she should be enjoying this. Still, he followed them outside of the station to one of the large platforms overlooking the rest of the Internet.

Ralph breathed, "Holy cow. Look at all this stuff!"

Vanellope's voice almost started to break when she said, "Whoa. This is the most beautiful miracle I have ever seen."

Even Turbo had to agree with her. "It's Turbo-tastic…" Forget about it being like a giant Game Central Station, this was more like a densely packed city. Everywhere Turbo looked something was going on.

"But it's so big, it goes on forever and ever…" A glitching noise came from Vanellope, and suddenly her excited demeanor was replaced with mild panic. "How are we possibly g-g-gonna find-find eBay out there-"

"Hey, kid, kid!" Ralph soothed, and the girl's glitching subsided. "Don't worry. I'm sure there's someone out here who can give us directions." He glanced around and pointed. "Oh! Look at that little egg guy! He's got one of those hats that smart people wear, I bet he could help us."

Turbo followed his gaze and saw a brown building labelled, "the SEARCHBAR – powered by KNOWSMORE". Inside was the aforementioned purple "egg guy" running back and forth in front of shelves lined with books. It seemed like the logical place to go. "Good job, Ralph," he commended. Then, unwilling to let his chance go by, he mocked, "If this is too scary for you, Vanellope, maybe you should just go home." He knew she wouldn't, but her silent glare at him was still pretty satisfying.

"Come on, both of you," said Ralph, obviously wanting to keep the peace between them. "We're all on the same side." He headed over to the building he saw.

Vanellope stuck her tongue out at Turbo before following her friend.

They approached just as a human finished her consultation with the searchbar operator. When he saw them step up to his desk, he greeted, "Hello and welcome to KnowsMore's searchbar. One at a time, please."

Turbo observed, "Hey, your voice sounds familiar… Are we related?"

KnowsMore scrutinized him through his large, round glasses. "I highly doubt it. You don't look like the type who reads a lot of books," he answered in his snobbish tone.

Slighted, Turbo leaned over the desk and retorted, "I'll have you know I am _twice_ as smart-" but Ralph moved him aside without letting him finish.

"Don't mind him. Look, we're in a bit of a hurry," the wrecker pointed out.

"Of course you are, sir." KnowsMore flipped through a book that was in front of him. "Interesting, you don't seem to have a search history. Well let's start one for you. What can KnowsMore help you find today?"

"Um-"

"Umbrella? Umbrage? Umami?" KnowsMore interjected.

Ralph furrowed his brows in annoyance. "No-"

"Noah's ark? No Doubt? Nordstrom Rack?"

Ralph growled.

"Ergonomics? Urban Outfitters? Urkel! Played by Jaleel White."

Ralph gave up and turned to his friends. "Looks like no one put Humpty Dumpty back together again. This guy's a little soft-boiled."

Vanellope suggested, "I'm pretty sure he's just trying to guess what you're gonna say."

KnowsMore rubbed his face and admitted, "Yes, I'm sorry, but my autofill is a touch aggressive today."

Turbo scoffed, "I bet I could do his job better than him."

This prompted an eye-roll from KnowsMore. "Ha! I'd like to see you try."

The racer cleared his throat and imitated KnowsMore's voice and mannerisms to near perfection, "Hello and welcome to KnowsMore's searchbar. Since you're video game characters, I will suggest things related to you. _Turbo Time_? _Street Fighter II: Turbo_? Turbo engines?"

KnowsMore's eyes widened and he said, impressed, "Oh you're good."

"Let me try." Vanellope stepped in front of Turbo, apparently eager to get on with their search. "eBay _Sugar Rush_ steering wheel." She smacked the touch screen on the front of the desk, causing several books to flash different colours.

KnowsMore twitched uncontrollably for a second, then glanced down at his book. "Oh! I only found one result for your query," he told them. "Hmm, isn't that interesting."

The touch screen displayed a picture of the steering wheel, and Ralph stared in shock. "What? How did you-?"

"Ah, the Internet's very intuitive." Vanellope saluted KnowsMore with a grin. "Thank you, Mr. KnowsMore!" She selected the picture and a box-like capsule formed around her, Ralph, and Turbo, squishing them together.

KnowsMore smiled gratefully. "Well, you're welcome!" He waved as the box took them to their destination. "Oh I like her."

Turbo gawked at him, bewildered that anyone who sounded like him could like Vanellope. He immediately decided he and KnowsMore wouldn't be friends anytime soon. Turbo tried to put as much distance between himself and the other two as the capsule would allow.

Ralph spoke up, "Well, at least we know where to go if we ever need a pair of goggles."

Turbo craned his head to look at the building he was referencing. "That says 'Google', Ralph."

"Now that doesn't make any sense. What's a google?"

They passed by a tall tree where blue birds perched on the many branches. One of them tweeted out a picture of a grumpy-looking cat; the others responded with much angry squawking.

"Are we there yet?" Turbo rasped, nearly choking on the stench.

"Look, there it is!" he heard Vanellope announce up front. "eBay!"

Not soon enough, the capsule disintegrated and dropped them off at the entrance. Many rows of long aisles lined with booths were in front of them, each containing various items up for bidding. Everything seemed to be dividing into different sections.

All hope seemed restored to Vanellope as she said, "Guys, we're actually gonna save my game!"

"Told you not to worry," said Ralph, walking ahead. "We just gotta keep our eyes on the prize and stay focused."

A colourful person spontaneously popped up in front of them with a digital board and announced, "Get rid of belly fat using this one weird trick!"

"I love weird tricks!" Ralph sounded intrigued.

"Later," Turbo told him sternly when he saw him slowing down.

Someone else appeared to the right and flashed his board in Ralph's face. "Sassy housewives want to meet you!"

"No time." Then Turbo glared at the person. "Wait, why just him?"

Another one said, "These child stars went to prison! Number 6 will surprise you!"

Ralph glanced over. "That sounds interesting."

"It sounds pointless."

A green man popped up and asked, "Wanna get rich playing video games? Click here to find out how!"

Before Ralph could even respond, Turbo and Vanellope grabbed each of his hands and led him along. "No, thanks!" they said in unison.

"I'll be right here if you change your mind!" he called out.

Turbo let go of Ralph when they were further along. "Now, no more distractions."

"Right. Sorry."

The trio passed several odd items, such as a painting of a sorrowful kitten, a "Steampunk" keyboard (which was just a regular keyboard with gears glued on it), and a Dukes of Hazzard ashtray. Turbo passively wondered, _Who buys any of this crap?_

Ralph extended his hand to Vanellope and prompted, "Hey kid, hop up here and see if you could tell where they keep their steering wheels."

She did and when Ralph held her high above his head she gazed at the giant floating words with accompanying pictures to find the right section. "There's a bunch of, like, sports memorabilia… Big baby clothes… 'Ling-ery?'" She rotated and then spotted a different area. "Oh, there's a row with a bunch of old video game junk."

When they reached the video game section, Turbo searched for the wheel with them, glancing down an aisle as they walked past. Then he stopped and backed up. Turbo gazed down that aisle and blinked several times to make sure he wasn't seeing things.

Each booth contained _Turbo Time_ merchandise.

"Wow," he breathed. As if drawn by a magnet, he wandered into the aisle and peered at the available items. One of them was an alarm clock with his face on it. "Heheh, Turbo _Time_! I get it!" Others included bed sheets, posters, a lunch box, a yo-yo, and even a skateboard.

Turbo's eyes welled up at seeing such dedication for him and the _Turbo Time_ twins. All this time he thought he'd been forgotten; he never thought there were fans out there who still loved him.

And then he looked at the prices and realized they probably didn't love him that much.

"Oh for—five dollars?!" he exclaimed at a human placing a bid on a Turbo snow globe. "I'm worth more than that!"

The timer ran out and the auctioneer slammed his gavel. "Sold for five US dollars to Gameo_83!"

"Yippee!" the avatar cheered almost robotically.

Turbo sighed. At least the person had bought something. There were only a few others in the aisle but they were only browsing. Even so, Turbo found it hard to stay disappointed. The very fact that his merchandise existed meant that his legacy lived on long after his game was first released. He couldn't wait to tell the others!

_Oh yeah, I forgot about Ralph and Vanellope._ Turbo returned to the main floor and scanned the area. Further ahead looked like video game equipment, so he went there. "Ralph! Vanellope!" he called. "You better not have left me behind, because I can see you doing that!"

Just before panic could set in, he located them. "Oh, there you are!" He sprinted over to the two as they turned around.

Vanellope visibly deflated. "Aw, I wanted to leave him behind."

"Turbo, where have you been?" asked Ralph.

Unable to contain his elation, Turbo blurted out while gesturing wildly, "It was amazing! Oh, you should've seen all this cool _Turbo Time_ stuff! There was an alarm clock, and a yo-yo—guys! I was a yo-yo!"

"_Was_?" muttered Vanellope with an eye-roll.

"You're just jealous because the only thing connected to your game is a junky steering wheel."

"Well that 'junky' steering wheel is what's gonna get my game plugged back in," she reminded. "And while you were off in Turbo Land, we actually managed to do what we came here for."

Ralph proudly held up his voucher- a small case with a picture of the wheel on it. "Ta-da!"

Turbo gasped with a smile. "You actually did it! Ha-ha!" He started skipping to the checkout line. "What are we waiting for? Let's go home!" _Boy, this is gonna be a short journey._

* * *

When it was their turn at the checkout, they presented the clerk with their purchase and shipping address for the arcade.

The lady typed the information in, then said, "With expedited shipping, that should arrive Wednesday morning."

Ralph turned to his friends with a grin. "That's two whole days before Litwak scraps your game! We're way ahead of schedule!" He gave them both a high-five. "We rule!"

"I'll just need a credit card number."

Ralph blinked. "Sorry, what's a credi…" He fumbled the rest.

She glanced up at him over the rims of her glasses. "A credit. Card. Number."

Growing impatient, Turbo prodded, "Go on, Ralph. Tell her."

"Number. Right. Uh… 7."

Then Turbo's heart sank. _Oh no…_

"Excuse me?"

Ralph tried again. "Sorry. No, you're right. Ridiculous. I meant 11."

But the woman bluntly stated, "Those aren't credit card numbers."

"I'm pretty sure they are," Ralph said, a little taken aback.

Turbo hissed at the wrecker, "I thought you were gonna memorize Litwak's credit card number!"

"I didn't know I needed it! And even if I did, how could I see where it is?"

"Well you didn't say anything, so I assumed you knew what you were doing!"

The clerk spoke up, "How exactly do you intend to pay for this item, sir? You owe $27,001."

Turbo's jaw dropped. "How did it get that much?! It was supposed to be 200!"

Vanellope snarked matter-of-factly, "If you had been with us, you would've known that we needed to say higher numbers so that another guy wouldn't be able to take it."

"Yeah," Ralph laughed, "that guy couldn't come up with numbers higher than 500!"

Turbo was speechless. How could they be so dense? Any other time he would boast about his superior intelligence, but now it felt like more of a burden. Was he supposed to do everything himself? All he could say was, "How do you know about arranged marriages but not the basics of paying for things?!"

"Wait, so we need, like, money?" Vanellope inquired to the clerk, who looked like she was getting more annoyed by the second.

"Yes. And if you don't have a credit card, we also accept Pay Pal, Verifone, ProPay, SquareCash, and BuzzzBucks."

Vanellope started to chuckle nervously. "Ok, here's the thing—you're gonna laugh. So, this big galoot," she patted Ralph's shoulder, "he left his wallet at home."

"Yeah. Yeah!" Ralph played along. "I did leave my wallet at home in my wallet room, and the door's locked."

The clerk remained unfazed. "If you don't pay within 24 hours, you will be in violation of the unpaid item policy. You will forfeit the bid and you will lose this item."

Turbo gripped the edge of the table and cried, "No! You don't understand! We need this steering wheel to save our game!"

"Not my problem. Next!"

Turbo moaned in defeat and planted his face on the desk.

* * *

"How were we supposed to know how auctions work?" Vanellope demanded Turbo as the three of them left eBay. "How do _you_ even know how auctions work?"

"I happen to be very cultured," he bragged spitefully without looking at her.

Ralph continued to grumble beside them. As he passed a human avatar, he said, "Hey buddy, you goin' to eBay? Well, I got some free advice for you: _don't_. What a scam!" In his rage he punched his fist through an eBay sign. Of course, since it was virtual, it went through without doing any damage. "The signs aren't even real!"

"Hey, genius, it's a hologram," Turbo pointed out in annoyance.

But Ralph ripped the projecting base of the sign and hurled it far away, where it crushed a human avatar who may or may not have been an Internet celebrity. Perhaps to not invoke another one of Vanellope's panic attacks, he took a deep breath and said, "It's ok. All we gotta do is figure out a way to earn a little bit of moolah."

Vanellope doubtfully stated, "We're video game characters, Ralph. We don't have moolah."

"Unless you can think of some magical way to get rich playing video games," sighed Turbo.

Ralph stopped walking. Then he turned to face them with the smile of an epiphany.

Sensing his idea, Turbo held up one authoritative hand. "Wait, I know what you're thinking, and the answer is no. We are _not_ doing that."

* * *

They did.

"Can you please tell us how to get rich playing video games?" Ralph begged.

"You bet!" said the thin, green pop-up man from earlier. "By the way, my name is J.P. Spamley." He held his digital board in front of him. "Click here and I'll take you to my website."

Before Ralph could do so, Turbo asked in suspicion, "How do we know we can trust you?"

Spamley put his hand on Turbo's shoulder, much to the latter's discomfort. "Relax, pal. I'm just an honest guy tryin' to make a living by helping folks make a living. I'm not one of those clickbait jerks, I swear!"

Turbo narrowed his eyes, not sure what he meant. But if this was the only way… He sighed and finally nodded at Ralph, who tapped on the screen.

After squeezing uncomfortably into Spamley's dinky old vehicle, they puttered along slowly to a very rundown part of the Internet until they stopped in front of a dimly lit building called Lootfindr.

"I'd like to welcome the three of you to the Spamley family!" their host said, leading them inside. "Step into my parlour."

Turbo wrinkled his nose in disgust. Papers were strewn about, cardboard boxes lined the walls, and piles of junk made for very little room to walk around. "This is your website?"

"I know what you're thinking." Spamley tried to tidy up. "Not to worry, because my anti-virus guy was just here. Clean as a-"

"BUG!" Turbo jumped involuntarily at a roach-like microchip that had been under a box Spamley picked up.

Despite it appearing to be some kind of virus, Spamley easily crushed it to nothing under his shoe. "Oh my gosh, that's embarrassing," he chuckled nervously, putting the box away.

Turbo shivered and tried to relax. At least it hadn't been a Cybug.

Spamley started rummaging through a box of files. "Anyway, I know it's a little messy." He suddenly shouted, "Hey, GORD!" He got no response, other than the arcade trio's confused looks, so he continued, "I do have a system here, I really do, if I could just find that—GORD!"

Just when Turbo thought Spamley was crazy and that they should make a run for it, he sensed a presence behind him and glanced over his shoulder. He, Ralph, and Vanellope gasped in surprise and jumped away from a diminutive figure cloaked in a sweater up to his large eyeballs.

"Oh, there you are." Spamley turned to him. "These guys are looking to get rich playing video games. What do you got for them, partner?"

Turbo watched uneasily as Gord handed him and Vanellope a file each, and then proceeded to literally stretch his arm up to Ralph's face to give him one, all without moving his eyes. Turbo looked at his file, if only so he didn't have to look at the strange creature. It was a picture of a Diamond Sword and armor from something called _Minecraft_, and above it was the price of $100.

Vanellope stared at her file and spoke up, "So you're saying, if we find the Golden Cleats from _Pro League Soccer_ and bring them back here to you, a human being in the real world will pay us $15?"

Spamley answered, "Yes, ma'am! Welcome to the exciting world of loot hunting! Folks go into games, they harvest the most coveted items, and they sell 'em on my website to the highest bidder!"

"Isn't that like cheating?" Turbo wondered aloud.

"Nope, it's just lazy."

"Ok, and here's the thing," said Vanellope, "we need like a buttload of money. Do you have any more… _lucrative_ items, maybe?"

Turbo eyed her strangely. "You can't pronounce lingerie but you know what lucrative means?"

"Shush!"

Gord extended his arm towards Spamley and gave him another file.

"Thank you, buddy, you're such a nice guy." The green man smirked and showed the file to the others. "Is this lucrative enough for you?"

The file showed a sleek car, apparently belonging to someone called Shank. The price was a whopping $40,000.

"It's more than enough!" Ralph exclaimed.

Turbo added merrily, "Ooh, and it's in a game called _Laughter Race_! That sounds nice."

"Whoops." Spamley moved his thumb, revealing a letter it had been accidentally covering. "There we go."

"_Slaughter Race_?!" Turbo's shoulders sagged in worry. "Maybe it's nice on the inside?"

Spamley gave a dry laugh and explained, "_Slaughter Race_ is the most popular online racing game out there. However, it's wicked dangerous."

"We ain't afraid of danger." Ralph put his hand on Vanellope's back and boasted, "This kid is the best racer in the whole world!"

"Ahem?!" Turbo pierced him with a glare.

"Ok, ok, you're pretty great too."

"Hmm."

Ralph promised Spamley, "We'll get you that car, no problem-o!"

* * *

**Yes, that was a **_**Toy Story 2**_** reference back up there. If only this sequel was as good as that one…**


	4. Grand Theft Turbo

**Is anyone else bothered by **_**Slaughter Race**_**? …No? Just me?**

* * *

Chapter 4: Grand Theft Turbo

The grunge-filled city went on for miles. Walking through it made Turbo feel like he'd just gotten there after the end of a zombie apocalypse; broken cars, garbage littering the streets, buildings with smashed windows—you know, the usual. And for some reason everything was tinged in yellow as if he was looking at the world through a mug of beer.

And that was before he witnessed two cars crashing into each other and going up in flames. His pyrophobia rarely came up anymore since everyone in the arcade knew about it, but this was a startling scene that triggered memories he would rather forget. _You're ok,_ he assured himself, forcing his breathing to slow. _You're not on fire. Just keep walking and don't look at it._

A barking dog snapped him out of his thoughts. The large black hound snarled rapidly as it crept closer.

Turbo instinctively hid behind Ralph. "Do something!"

Ralph nervously held out his hands and tried to appease, "Nice kitty! Nice kitty!"

A shark unexpectedly emerged from a nearby open manhole and chomped its jaws around the dog, then slunk back to the sewer.

"That was… random," Turbo commented, unsure if he should be relieved or even more afraid.

Ralph kept walking cautiously. "Let's just find Shank's car and get out of here."

"Agreed." Vanellope shuddered and stayed close to her friend for the rest of the search.

Eventually they came to a garage. It was too big to not be important, so they figured it had to be the place. After the three of them snuck through a window on the upper side, they found themselves on a catwalk overlooking the garage. And right below them under a spotlight was the car they'd been looking for.

"Look, there it is!" Vanellope whispered. "That car is gorgeous! No wonder it's worth so much."

It wasn't a race car in the traditional sense and certainly not as cool as his Turbomobile, but Turbo had to agree with her. "That Shank guy has good taste."

The sound of the door opening made them shrink down against the catwalk. Two people entered, and judging by their clunky movements and odd names hovering above their heads, they had to be gamers.

"Oh no," Turbo groaned quietly. "They beat us to it."

The boy player said to his female companion in a pre-pubescent voice, "31 hours of continuous gameplay, and we finally found Shank's car. Let's jack this ride."

"Oh yeah, DirtySocks, it's on," she responded with enthusiasm.

A faint voice could be heard from his side of the microphone, causing DirtySocks to suddenly yell, "No, Grandma, I'm doing my homework!" He cleared his throat and returned to seriousness. "Ok, like I said, let's jack this ride."

Another female voice spoke up, "While the cat was away, these mice tried to play," and then a slim figure stepped into the light. Brown wavy hair peeked out from the hood of her leather jacket, framing a delicate face.

Ralph whispered, "I think that might be Shank."

Turbo gasped in shock, "Shank is a girl?!" before Ralph and Vanellope hushed him, flattening him against the catwalk. Thankfully, the others hadn't heard them, as Shank kept taunting. It wasn't the fact she was a female racer that surprised him; he'd spent years with them and knew how formidable they could be. But in a harsh, ugly environment, he never expected anyone so… _pretty_. It must've been the high definition.

The members of Shank's gang came out from the shadows, each of them brandishing a different weapon. They encircled the two gamers threateningly.

"Pyro, give those punks the works," Shank prompted, stepping back.

"With pleasure." The lanky man moved forward with a sly grin, and much to Turbo's horror, he was holding a flamethrower.

The racer knew what was coming. He covered his eyes seconds before he heard the explosion of flames, a cry rising in his throat, masked by the screams of the players as they became engulfed. Only when it was silent did he dare look.

All that was left of the gamers were chalk outlines on the burnt floor.

His courage disintegrated on the spot as well, and no amount of self-motivation would get it back. _This is NOT what I signed up for!_ Without a second thought, Turbo started to crawl away to the window, gasping for air as quietly as he could. _Nope, nope, nope, nope._

"What are you doing?" Vanellope hissed. "Get back here!"

"No thanks, I choose life," was his response. The smell of smoke was already starting to make him feel sick.

"I'm with Turbo on this," said Ralph, who Turbo noticed was crawling at his heels. "If we get burnt up in here, that's it. We're dead. We're gone."

Vanellope stopped them both. "No, wait! I have an idea." Then she smiled deviously. "Buuut if this is too scary for you, Turbo, maybe you should just go home."

The nerve of her, using his line against him! But that did it, much to his displeasure. _You win this round, Glitch. _He turned to glower at her. "What idea?"

* * *

"This is not gonna work…" Turbo mumbled apprehensively beside Ralph.

"Just act natural." Ralph knocked on the door of Shank's garage and put on his best fake smile.

A couple nerve-wracking seconds went by, and then the door opened to reveal Shank and her entire gang.

Seeing her face unhooded and up close made Turbo's brain fritz and he forgot everything he was supposed to say, so he just buckled under her steely gaze. _Wow, she's got fine eyes… Ack! What are you thinking? She approves of arson! _he mentally berated.

When it seemed like Turbo was just going to zone out, Ralph started, "Good day to you, madam! My name is… John. And this is… Alan." He gave Turbo a subtle nudge.

Something came back to him and he said, "Uh, yeah, we're from the arcade committee-"

"Noise!" Ralph murmured under his breath.

"Er, noise! Committee. Actually it's more of a department, really. The Department of Noise…" _Stop getting tongue-tied and just get to the point! _Turbo cleared his throat and stammered, "A-anyway, the thing is, we've been getting complaints down at HQ about a lot of gun sounds, so we came to check on things…" He gulped at the pyromaniac and found himself adding a weak chuckle.

Shank glanced between the two of them, then scoffed. "Are you serious?"

Ralph folded his hands behind his back and answered, "Yes ma'am. And if you and your posse don't cooperate, I'm afraid John and I will have to fine you for disturbing the peace."

Shank raised an eyebrow suspiciously and pointed at Ralph. "I thought you said _you_ were John."

Turbo quickly hissed to him between his teeth, "You _are_ John! You said so yourself!"

Ralph countered not as subtly, "Well maybe I want to be Alan!"

"It's too late to change names!"

"I wanna be Alan!"

Turbo facepalmed so he wouldn't have to see Shank's judgemental expression he just knew she had, and she wouldn't have to see the embarrassed flush on his face. _We blew it…_

A car revved up from inside the garage, and Turbo had never been happier to see Vanellope driving towards him at top speed. Shank and her crew leapt out of the way, but Turbo and Ralph got caught on the hood.

"Nice job, John and Alan!" she teased.

"Yeah, it worked like a charm!" Ralph seemed to honestly believe that.

Turbo started to climb up the windshield and he demanded, "What took you so long?"

Vanellope sped up. "Just get in!"

Ralph took up both the passenger seat and the one behind it, leaving Turbo to sit in the seat behind Vanellope. "I wanted to drive," he complained.

"It's a shame we have to leave so soon, this game is cool!" the little girl sighed, ignoring him.

Ralph slumped back tiredly. "Just get us outta here so we can get this car to Spamley and get paid."

"No problem!"

"Excuse me!" Turbo spoke up louder. "I'll get us outta here, let me drive!"

Vanellope casted him a pretentious glance. "No way! You did your part, now I'm doing mine!"

The sound of a car speeding up on the other side of the divider interrupted them.

"Watch this guy coming in hot," she noted.

One of Shank's gang, a burly guy with a bandana, launched his bull-horned car off a ramp and landed in front of them. He drove under a larger truck, flipping it over him into Vanellope's path.

Turbo gripped the back of her seat. "Incoming!"

"Aah!" She swerved, just missing some of the barrels falling from the truck, and pulled up beside her attacker.

He warned, "You mess with the bull, you get the horns, little girl!"

"Slow down, you can go behind him!" Turbo instructed.

Vanellope shifted, speeding up to avoid him slamming his car into hers.

"Or… that works too."

Soon after, they heard a screeching noise behind them. Ralph looked back and announced, "Oh no, it's that Shank lady! She looks upset!"

_Don't look, don't look…_ Turbo risked a glance anyway to see Shank racing towards them in a different car, her hair whipping back in the wind. Even at this distance he could see her intense glare burning into them.

"Ah, don't worry, I'll lose her." Vanellope turned sharply onto another street, then drove in circles around a liquor store while Ralph kept screaming.

"What are you doing?!" Ralph clutched the door. "Get back on the track, I'm gonna lose my cookies!"

"There is no track! I can drive anywhere!"

The centrifugal force pushed Turbo to Ralph's side and he yelled, "Just get out of the donut, it's not working!"

She drifted out of the circle and raced down a street, crashing through a barrier to get onto a dirt road.

Turbo pointed his thumb behind him and groaned, "They exit's over there! You're going the wrong way!"

She checked her surroundings. "We're taking the scenic route!"

They went into a grimy tunnel, but it did nothing to deter Shank, who Turbo noticed had already caught up with them.

Ralph alerted, "Kid, she's coming up right behind us!" He waved innocently as she flanked them. "Oh, hello!"

The woman eyed Vanellope. "I believe you have something of mine?"

Vanellope goaded, "Yeah? Come and get it." She shifted again and floored the gas, pulling ahead.

Obstacles flew past as she weaved back and forth around them, with Turbo calling out to guide her, "Left! Right! Left again! I said left, not right!"

"No backseat driving, I can't concentrate!"

All of a sudden Shank's car dropped in front of them from one side of the wall and slammed on the brakes.

Vanellope cried out, but instead of stopping, she accelerated and drove up the wall, arching over Shank and coming back down the other side before leaving the tunnel.

"I could've done that," muttered Turbo with his head leaning on his hand boredly.

It wasn't long before Shank was beside them again, and Ralph urged Vanellope, "Would you hurry up and lose her?"

"I'm trying!"

Turbo growled, "This is why I should drive!" A train blared its horn on tracks parallel to them and he cocked his head at it. "You think you can make that?"

Vanellope looked over and seemed to understand. "I can try. Hang on, guys!" She turned into a drift, heading right for the train tracks. The oncoming train just missed them, but she kept drifting past cars in an intersection until she came to a stop in front of an alley.

Turbo saw Shank coming after them, apparently having made it past the train as well. "Back up!" he shouted.

Vanellope swiftly reversed before Shank could ram into them. When she exited the alley, she raced forward on the road. In her rear-view mirror she saw Shank turn a corner right behind them. "Whoa, Mother Hubbard, this lady can really drive!"

Turbo wasn't sure if he was impressed or irritated by Shank's driving skills, but he didn't have time to think because of what he saw up ahead. "AAAH! FIRE! THERE'S A FIRE!" he screamed, digging his fingers into the back of Vanellope's seat. He couldn't tear his eyes away from the tunnel of burning tires and debris blocking the exit.

Ralph leaned back and added, "It's a dead end!"

"Not for me," Vanellope said brightly. "Bye-bye, Shanky!" She sped up right for it.

"NO! STOP!" Turbo could already feel the heat on his skin and he squeezed his eyes shut, unable to do anything but scream and wait for the painful scorching… But it never came. He heard Vanellope glitch and felt his own pixels scatter, and when he opened his eyes they were on the other side of the inferno.

"Woo-hoo!" Vanellope cheered. "That's the stuff!"

Ralph gave her a pat on the back. "Good job, kid!"

"Aw yeah, I feel like me again!" The girl pointed. "One exit straight ahead!" She smirked in the rear-view mirror and asked, "You ok, Turbs?"

He was gasping too deeply to respond, and when he did it was to shout, "You nearly killed me!"

"But I didn't!"

Turbo let out a ragged sigh and finally pried his hands off the seat, slumping back. "Well, at least we made it."

But he spoke too soon.

"You're not gonna lose me that easy," Shank said, driving up beside them. _Backwards._

Vanellope's eyes widened. "How did you-"

"Uh, you might wanna keep your eyes on the road."

Ralph gasped, "Kid!"

A bus was crossing their path, and they were heading right for it.

Vanellope screamed and hit the brakes, skidding the car to a sideways stop in front of the bus. And right there beyond it was the exit.

Turbo stared at her, aghast. "Why did you stop?! You could've glitched right through it! In fact, you could've been glitching this whole time!"

"I panicked, ok?!" she shot back.

Shank's gang surrounded them in their cars, and the woman herself stepped out of her stolen vehicle and slammed the door. "Yo, Department of Noise. Get out of my car!"

_Quick, play dumb! _Turbo grinned sheepishly and asked, "What car?" _Not that dumb!_

Vanellope whimpered, "Oh man, what are we gonna do?"

"You just stay put. Don't panic," Ralph told her quietly. "I'm gonna talk to her."

She put a hand on his arm. "Ralph, be careful."

"It's fine. This is what heroes do," he said, proudly holding up his cookie medal. He tucked it away and tried to get out of the car. "I'm stuck." After struggling for a few seconds, he fell out and attempted to compose himself. "This car is not designed for a big boy."

Shank was not amused. "You guys really thought you could just steal my car? Well, let me tell you what's gonna happen now."

Immediately thinking of the flamethrower, Turbo jumped out of the car and ran to Ralph's side. "No, no, wait! Please, just hear us out!" he begged, flinching when Shank flicked her dark eyes to him. Still, he went on, "We aren't normally car thieves, we just need enough money to buy a part to save my game!"

"Nice try."

"No, it's true!" Ralph interjected, his voice breaking. "It's not just him, my other friend is a racer too. You should see her racing on her sweet little track in her cookie wafer kart we built together…"

Turbo cringed as Ralph continued to blabber. This pitiable behaviour would never work on someone as cold as Shank. Even Vanellope groaned softly in embarrassment and tried to hide herself.

Then something unexpected happened. When Ralph's sobs became unintelligible, Shank took his hand and said, "Ok, ok! You can stop crying. Though I do respect your wonderful display of vulnerability."

Ralph wiped his nose and sniffed. "Thank you."

_What the?!_ Under that tough exterior she was… nice? Turbo glanced between her and Ralph, then, finding himself wanting attention, spoke up, "I too have been known to cry… single manly tears, on occasion."

Shank gave him a cool smile, but at least it was something other than anger. "I'm sure you have."

Vanellope came over and asked, "So, you're not mad?"

"No. I get it, I do." Shank told her warmly. She gestured to her crew. "Friendship is everything to us too. Right, guys?"

"Right!" they replied, all hint of animosity gone from them.

"We're like a family."

Now that Ralph had calmed down, he asked hopefully, "So does this mean we can keep your car?"

"Absolutely not," she said sternly.

"What?!" Turbo exclaimed. And just when he was starting to like her. "After all that you still won't help us? Can we at least try again but with me driving?"

She held up her hands. "I didn't say I don't wanna help. But there are better ways to make money on the Internet than stealing cars." She turned to her female punk friend next to her. "Hey, you got your phone on you?"

"You know it!" She handed the smart phone to Shank.

"Let's make a video." Shank held it in front of her face, pointed it at Ralph, and said, "Pyro! Hit big boy with the Blow and Go."

Ralph looked confused. "Wait, what's a Blow and-" His face was blasted with air from Pyro's machine, which filled his mouth and flapped his hair.

Shank shouted over the noise, "Say something. First thing that comes to your mind."

Of course, Ralph said as best he could with lips stretched wide, "I'm gonna wreck it!"

"Good! All right, turn it off."

The blowing gun stopped. "What the heck did you do that for?" asked Ralph, massaging his jaw.

Shank answered, "You're gonna be a BuzzzTube star."

"Am I supposed to know what that is?"

Shank's punk friend spoke up, "Come on now, everybody knows BuzzzTube! It's the video sharing site."

Shank fiddled with the phone. "I'm just starting your account. Alright, there you go." She showed the phone playing Ralph's video to them. "If this thing goes viral, you can make a lot of money."

_I don't see how…_ Turbo thought doubtfully.

She added, "A friend of mine, chick named Yesss, she's the head algorithm over there. Tell her I sent you. Yesss will hook you up."

"You're just full of bright ideas, aren't you, Wonder Woman?" muttered Turbo with a hint of sarcasm.

Vanellope smiled gratefully at Shank. "Wow, that's very nice of you. Thank you."

Ralph mumbled to Turbo, "Not sure if 'nice' is the right word," to which the racer grunted in agreement.

Shank returned the expression to Vanellope. "I should be thanking you, little sister. That race was fun."

The girl blushed shyly and chuckled, "Oh. Well, uh, thank you again."

Not wanting her to get all the credit, Turbo informed, "Excuse me, but I was the one telling her what to do."

"No you wer-"

"I _am_ the greatest racer ever, after all." He puffed his chest out and flashed his cocky grin. "Turbo from _Turbo Time_. You've probably heard of me."

The woman shook her head apologetically. "Mmm… No, sorry. I'm only familiar with the popular games players talk about."

Turbo balked. "P-popular?!" _That's it. Negative all the points for you, lady._

Vanellope pushed Turbo aside and asked, "Shank, what moves did you do to get through the tunnel of fire? Was it a power drift into a drift jump, maybe?"

Shank remained coy. "Maybe. If you ever want to come back for a rematch, I'd be happy to kick your butt again."

Turbo snarked, "Yeah, well, you wouldn't be so confident if you were up against me."

Instead of being offended, she seemed to take it curiously. "We'll have to find out, then."

"What?"

"You're also welcome to stop by anytime for a race. If you're the greatest racer ever, you should have nothing to worry about."

He honestly wasn't expecting that, but his ego wouldn't let him back down. "It's a date—DEAL!" He cleared his throat, trying to appear nonchalant.

"I'll be waiting." She hopped into her car and flicked two fingers at them. "See ya." Then she tore away, driving backwards over a ramp, seemingly in slow motion.

Sunlight gleamed off the hood of her car, and Turbo couldn't help but watch the feat with begrudging respect. She winked at him—or maybe it was directed at all of them—before she disappeared behind a moving train.

"Whoa," breathed Vanellope.

Turbo shook his head clear of positive thoughts and crossed his arms. "Show off."

* * *

"That place was scary," Ralph mentioned once they had left.

Vanellope walked along wistfully. "I know, it was so exciting!"

"No, exciting is when you smile. Scary is when you clench your butt. And my butt is still clenched!"

"Thanks for that update," said Turbo wryly. He had to concur with Ralph, though. The further they got away from _Slaughter Race_, the better he felt.

Vanellope looked up to her large friend. "Oh come on, are you honestly telling me that Shank lady wasn't the coolest person you ever met?" She glanced at the pale racer and added slyly, "Turbo seemed to think so."

"What?! No I don't!" he immediately denied, glaring at the girl. He hoped she interpreted the colour rushing to his cheeks as a sign of anger. "I bet she's cheating. No one's that good at racing."

"I've beaten you plenty of times."

"Because you cheat!"

"Call it what you want, but you can't deny she's cool."

It was Ralph's turn to speak up. "Oh yeah? Name one cool thing about her."

Vanellope skipped ahead, looking up thoughtfully as she listed, "Let's see. She looks cool, she talks cool, she drives cool, her hair is cool, her car is cool-"

"Wait a minute," Ralph interrupted, "you're saying my hair's uncool?"

She turned to him and assured, "What? No. I'm just saying the game was next level. There's no one telling you what to do, where to go, and-"

"Hey, just where do you think you're going?"

Vanellope paused at the start of a bridge. "To BuzzzTube. It's this way."

Ralph's face became hard. "No, no, no, no, no, we're going back to Spamley's. He can give us some easier loot to find."

"No, we're supposed to see Shank's friend," the little girl insisted.

"Oh come on! I don't trust that Shank one bit."

"Neither do I," Turbo added, just to make it clear.

"Well I-"

A small boy in some kind of uniform materialized out of a blue flash right in front of them. "Hello, mister!" he greeted to Ralph in a chipper voice. "I'm your friendly eBay alert messenger!"

Ralph blinked. "An actual eBoy."

"Just here to let you know your bid expires in 8 hours."

"8 hours?!" Ralph cried in shock. "What happened to our 24 hours?"

Turbo pointed out, "Well, we did spend a lot of time with Spamley and looking for Shank's garage."

Ralph groaned, then acknowledged, "Ok, thanks, eBoy."

"You got it, Jackson!" eBoy cheerfully replied. In another blue flash he was gone.

Vanellope walked down the steps towards them and reasoned, "Guys, if we nickel and dime it with Spamley, it will take 20 years to make enough money to buy the wheel."

Turbo hated to admit it, but Vanellope made a valid point. "Fine," he sighed reluctantly. "But only because we're short on time, not because Wonder Woman told us to."

Vanellope looked at Ralph expectantly. "Well?"

Ralph rolled his eyes but conceded, "Alright, fine. We'll do it your way." He started up the bridge with them. "But I'm telling you right now that BuzzzTube place is a terrible idea."

* * *

**I always did wonder where those missing hours went.**

**And yes, it's implied Turbo has a little unwanted crush on Shank, but it probably won't go further than that. It's not my OTP, and it was mostly to have Turbo's impression of her be different from Ralph's anyway. **


	5. The Search for More Money

**One of my biggest complaints about the movie was that there were so many missed opportunities with regards to exploring the Internet. This chapter tries to remedy that, hence the length. And this is the trimmed down version…**

**Disclaimer: Turbo's views and opinions do not necessarily represent those of the author.**

* * *

Chapter 5: The Search for More Money

If Ralph didn't like BuzzzTube before, his opinion certainly changed after walking through it for a few minutes. "This place… is great! There are all kinds of videos in here!"

Turbo didn't see what the big deal was. So many videos were about the same subjects that he got tired of them. "Yeah, if you like babies and cats…"

Vanellope pointed to one screen. "Look! There's you!" On a rotating platform in the center of the building were a few large videos, and one of them was Ralph's. Human avatars tossed heart-shaped symbols into a suction device. "Wonder why those little guys are giving your video all those hearts."

"Obviously they love me," the wrecker concluded. "I told you this place was a good idea."

Vanellope smiled knowingly but said, "Yeah, I'm sure you did, doof."

Not wanting to waste any more time, Turbo spoke up, "Now, who are we supposed to see about getting paid again?"

"The head algorithm," said Vanellope, walking towards an elevator. "Her name is Yesss."

Yesss' office was at the top of the tower in the middle of the site. When the doors opened and they stepped inside, the fashionably dressed woman was sitting at her desk swiping through videos boredly with her assistant by her side.

"Heyyo!" Ralph greeted in his usual way. "Are you the head of Al Gore?"

The woman snapped her mohawked head up and corrected, "I am the head _algorithm_ of BuzzzTube, which means I curate the content at the Internet's most popular video sharing site, which means I don't have time to trifle with every shoeless, mouth-breathing hobo that trundles into my office!"

Turbo winced in sympathy for Ralph. _Ouch. He really does get this from everyone._

Yesss went back to her screen and waved a dismissive hand at her assistant. "Call security, Maybe!"

He gazed at the trio but his wide eyes were focused on Ralph. He then whispered to his boss, "Yes, b-but Yesss? This is the leaf blower guy."

She barely glanced up. "Who?"

"The man with the undulating jowls?"

"So?"

Maybe showed her the video on his screen. "His video has over 1.3 million hearts."

Her expression went from disgust to friendly in an instant. Even the lights on her jacket sparkled when she grinned. "Well! Why didn't you tell me I was in the presence of a genius?" She got up and strutted over to Ralph, commanding her assistant, "Grab him a drink."

Vanellope explained, "Yeah, this lady named Shank, she actually made the video. She's the one who told us to come see you."

"No wonder your video's so dope! Shank is for real cool."

"Right?" Vanellope agreed.

Turbo just rolled his eyes. He wished everyone would stop praising her. Even if it was kinda sorta true…

"Pfft! She is not!" Ralph said after taking a sip of his cocktail. "I'm the cool one getting all the hearts."

Yesss cooed, "Well, that's right, you big baby!" She pinched his cheek, getting a childish giggle out of him.

Turbo stared in amazement. What was Ralph's secret to getting all these women to fawn over him?

Yesss released her grip and asked, "Um, what'd you say your name was?"

"Ralph," he answered bashfully, "Wreck-it Ralph."

"Well, Wreck-it Ralph, you are trending!" She flicked her wrist like a magician and suddenly in her hand were the same heart symbols they'd seen earlier. "And these are for you." She palmed the hearts and swiped them at Ralph one at a time as she said, "Heart, heart, heart, heart…"

They floated around Ralph, who looked a bit confused at first, but then he started chanting along with Yesss and danced on his toes giddily.

Turbo swatted a heart that fell in front of his face and he cleared his throat. "Can we get on with this?"

"Yeah, not to buzzkill the love fest you guys got going on here," Vanellope said with a chuckle, "but Shank kinda told us that viral videos can make, like, actual money?"

Yesss turned to her. "Hearts are money, honey." She produced a screen and explained, "Your Buzzzy account converts hearts into dollars. Kaching!"

Ralph grinned at the figure he saw. "$43,000? Guys, we only needed $27,001. We're done!"

Turbo groaned in exasperation. "How do you still not know how numbers work? That says $43."

Ralph looked closer and frowned. "43? That's not even half of 27,001."

Vanellope fretted, "We only have 8 hours left to save my game…"

"I hate to say it, but that ain't happening," Yesss said, suddenly not sounding sympathetic at all. "Your video's tapped out."

"But I thought you said I was trenching."

"Trending," both Turbo and Vanellope corrected.

Yesss showed them another screen with a plummeting line graph. "You were, but that was 15 seconds ago. Now you're not." She turned away in disinterest and sauntered back to her desk. "Thanks for stopping by, though."

Maybe snatched Ralph's drink before he could finish it and returned to Yesss.

"I knew that silly video was a bad idea," sighed Turbo. "How could the humans have not gotten sick of it?"

Vanellope suggested, "What if we go back to _Slaughter Race_ and I ask Shank-"

"No!" Turbo shouted at once. He regained his composure when she gave him a quizzical look. "I mean… No, thanks."

"Don't worry, we're not going back to that death trap," Ralph reassured with a stern look at Vanellope. He stomped over to the head algorithm. "Yesss, what if I made a whole bunch of videos of me doing crazy things?"

"You mean saturate the market?" She sounded thoughtful. "That could give you a lot of hearts fast."

Vanellope went up to Ralph and asked, "Have you thought this through at all? What are you even planning to do in these videos?"

The wrecker shrugged. "I'll just copy whatever's popular."

Yesss beamed. "Genius!" She snapped her fingers. "Yo, Maybe, what's trending now?"

"Let's have a looky-looky…" Maybe pulled up several videos on his screen, flipping through them as he listed, "As usual, human suffering is #1. Followed by hot pepper eating challenges, video game walkthroughs, screaming goats are back…"

Turbo shook his head in incredulity as Maybe went on. How could humans like this stuff? Were they really that boring?

"And lastly, bee puns," Maybe finished dully.

"He won't be doing any bee puns," Yesss said, then gave Ralph an encouraged glance. "They're beneath you."

But Ralph straightened determinedly and declared, "Oh, I'm doing the bee pun. Yes I am! And I'll be eating a hot pepper, and I'll put on makeup-"

Turbo had heard enough. "Ralph! Are you listening to yourself? That one video was famous for a few minutes. You'd have to make hundreds of these stupid things to get the money!"

"Well, I'm cool now, so my fans will watch anything I put out."

Turbo scowled at Ralph's naïveté. "People care about _quality_ over quantity." Without thinking, he said, "I bet I could get the money we need faster than you, without resorting to making those kinds of videos. Then we'll see who's cooler."

Ralph crossed his arms but looked down at the white racer respectfully. "Challenge accepted."

Turbo shook his hand, a cunning smile spreading across his lips. But his brain questioned, _Wait, what just happened?!_

Yesss leapt out of her chair and onto her desk jubilantly. "A rivalry for the same cause! I love it! That is what the Internet was made for!" She pointed to the two of them. "Now boys, let's get to work!"

* * *

"In conclusion, Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom was a complete waste of time, intelligence, and Jeff Goldblum. B+!" Turbo stopped the recording and made a few quick edits. Then he posted the video and leaned back in satisfaction.

He'd already made 4 movie reviews and 6 song covers as well as several mixed media skits, and the hearts were racking up fast. His days of being humiliated were over. If Ralph wanted to make a fool of himself, who was he to stop him? Turbo was making money with dignity. The way he was going, he'd have enough in no time!

Just then, a skinny blue-haired man dressed in a business suit and carrying a briefcase materialized next to him. He spoke in a nasally voice, "Greetings, Turbo! A copyright holder has asked us to take down your video, 'Let's Watch with Turbo: Pokémon episode 1', due to a violation of our copyright policy. You now have 1 copyright strike against you."

"Wait, what the… Who the heck are you?!"

"Also, your video, 'Look What You Made Me Do: Turbo cover', contains content from Big Machine Records, who has blocked it in some countries."

"Oh, come on!" Turbo protested. "I don't even like Taylor Swift!"

The man suggested, "If you want to check your video status before you make it public, you can first upload it as unlisted. If you think we got it wrong and your account has more than 100,000 followers, you can appeal and we will review your unlisted video regardless of view count. However, you will not be allowed to exchange your heart count for usable currency."

Turbo stood up and demanded, "What kind of site is this?! Who do you think you are?!"

"My name is Nope," he replied. "I am the Content ID algorithm for BuzzzTube."

Turbo grunted. Yesss. Maybe. Nope. Who named these programs? "Look, pal, it's not like I was claiming that I own this content. Why would I even _want_ people to think I made Transformers: The Last Knight?"

"The copyright laws are there to protect producers' money—uh, image."

"But my videos are under fair use, so I haven't broken any laws!"

"How do you explain _these_ videos?" Nope called attention to a series of videos featuring clips from different sources edited with various visual effects and sentence mixing.

"They call it BuzzzTube Crap," he told him. Turbo wasn't a fan of the term, but the effort he put into them gave them a certain class that other BTC's didn't have. "And all those videos are clearly covered by the parody/satire clause."

"Any use of copyrighted images-" Nope quickly whispered, "that producers don't make money off of-" then went back to normal, "is strictly prohibited."

Turbo argued, "But all this stuff is free advertising to people that don't know about it! Isn't it more of a waste to stop people trying to promote content?"

"Producers have nothing better to do than sue Internet celebrities," he admitted.

"Seems more like a case of freedom of speech being threatened by insecure goons."

"You can express yourself in any way you want," assured Nope, "as long as you don't express yourself in any way you want. Especially if you use Turbo's image."

He gaped in confusion. "But I _am_ Turbo!"

"His image must be protected, even from yourself!"

"Then by that definition Wreck-it Ralph should be punished for using his own image!"

Nope stated, "I'll deal with him later, but what you're doing is wrong too."

Turbo growled in frustration. At this rate, the only videos he would be allowed to make would be exactly like the ones he said he wouldn't do. "What would happen if I still made the videos I want?"

"If another one of your videos receives a copyright strike, your account will have to be immediately terminated."

"Then all my hard work will have been for nothing!"

Nope took out a screen from his briefcase and said, "You can learn more about our copyright policy by watching 'BuzzzTube Copyright Basics'."

"Forget it!" Turbo stormed off. "I'll find some other way to make money!"

Nope put away his screen as his pager beeped. He checked it. "Uh-oh. Another AMV is using copyrighted footage and music!" He disappeared in a flash.

* * *

"Welcome back, humans! Turbo from _Turbo Time_ here with another Oculus Rift experience!" he greeted through his headset, which was fitted over his helmet along with the virtual reality apparatus. "This one's called Epic Roller Coasters. I'm really excited about it, and I hope you are too. Let's begin!"

As he enjoyed the virtual ride, a nearby camera was recording him. Off to the side was a screen showing the Twitch broadcast, including live footage from the Oculus Rift and Turbo's simultaneous reactions. There was another screen showing the Twitch chat.

So far he hadn't run into any problems with the streaming site. Despite his initial small following, he was quickly allowed into the Twitch Partner Program, as long as he kept promoting the Twitch Turbo service. Speaking of which…

"Oh, and remember, if you want ad-free viewing, go Turbo with Twitch Turbo!"

The profit made from subscribers was currently small, but it should increase exponentially by word of mouth. Who couldn't resist his charms and excellent commentary?

Once the virtual ride was over, Turbo lifted the gear from his eyes and took a quick glance at the Twitch screen, but found the amount of live viewers was dwindling. "No, come back!" he cried instinctively.

Judging by the rapid decrease of viewers, he must've come off as too desperate.

He ripped off his headset, threw it at the ground and fumed, "Who could be more interesting than me?" He stomped out of his recording studio and into the room for featured live channels.

One recently started channel had a middle age bearded man sitting in an expensive gaming chair playing _Fortnite_. The gameplay screen was quite small compared to the one focused on him and his bimbo girlfriend who didn't do anything except wear revealing clothing. And they already had a lot more live viewers than Turbo had.

"Oh great, the only way I can get more viewers is to grow a beard!" reasoned Turbo. "Or wear a bikini." Since he wasn't doing either of those, he left Twitch behind.

* * *

Turbo waited in line among various anime characters, each one eager to promote their show on Crunchyroll. He didn't make any episodes yet, but he figured he could pitch his idea and hopefully get a sign-on bonus.

He tuned in to the conversation between the curator and the character in front of him: a small, yellow duck.

"I'm sorry, Duck," the curator was saying, "but _Princess Tutu_ does not seem to be profitable enough to be hosted on our site."

Duck flapped her wings in indignation and quacked, "Fine! I'll take my show to KissAnime!" She waddled away with her beak in the air.

Turbo approached the desk and said, "Hi, I'm Turbo. I'd like to pitch an idea for an anime starring me. It's called, 'Turbo Time'."

"That doesn't sound like an anime…"

"Sometimes it goes with the subtitle, 'A Turbo-tastic Journey'."

"That's more like it!" the curator approved. "So, what's the summary?"

"Well, Turbo—that's me—is off to show that he's the greatest racer ever. So he races against twins to master an oval track."

"…That's it?"

"Uh… he also has to balance his dreams with schoolwork. And extra-curricular activities!" Turbo improvised. "And his car can transform into a mecha… because he has to save the world from an evil guy who wants to take over! And he's got lots of love interests…" He was starting to run out of ideas. "Um… and there's pterodactyls at some point?"

The curator didn't seem impressed anymore. "I don't know, it sounds too derivative." He squinted at Turbo and asked, "Are you even from a Japanese studio?"

Turbo stammered, "Uh, well, I… I'm Japanese enough!"

"I think your off-the-wall humour would be better suited with an American animation company, like Cartoon Network." He pointed across the way to the entrance to said place, where the main cast of _Teen Titans Go!_ performed wacky antics.

"Ugh…" Turbo walked away in dejection.

* * *

_Maybe videos aren't the way to go,_ he thought. _What if I branch out?_

He'd come across a banking site, which looked like, well, a bank. It would be possible to steal all he needed from it, but the resulting attention in the human world from such an action would be a lot more trouble that it was worth. Besides, Shank already said there were better ways than theft.

Not that he was trying to impress her or anything. Because, of course, he wasn't.

Turbo contemplated. Aside from his racing abilities, he had an extensive knowledge of coding. Perhaps there was a website that he could use to monetize that skill.

His search took him to the Game Distribution District, which was designed like an outlet mall with the various sites in close proximity to each other. As such, the most popular sites seemed to be very competitive.

"Your games are just for filthy casuals!" the Playstation manager heckled his neighbour.

The App Store manager countered, "At least we have games!"

Turbo chuckled and kept walking, passing the Wii Shop. A sign on the window read, "We're moving!" and pointed next door to the Nintendo eShop.

The characters from the stores were free to mingle, however, as Turbo noticed many strolling on the boulevard. Nearby, a group of half a dozen Marios were marching together with one of them jumping every few steps. "Excuse me, Mario?"

Every one of them stopped and turned their heads to him.

"Er, not all of you. Who's the main Mario?"

One of them spoke up, "I am!"

One pointed at another one. "He is!"

A third, "We are!"

"Me too!" said the last.

Turbo rolled his eyes. "You can't all be Mario!"

"Yes-a we can! This is the Super Mario Club!" they declared, posing.

"Ok, I don't really care. How can I make money here?"

The first Mario answered, "Most indie games can be sold on Steam!" All of them pointed to a massive dark blue building. "If you're lucky, you can also get it promoted on Nintendo Switch!"

"Cool. Thanks."

And then he found out what indie games were by looking at different examples. "I don't get it," he said to himself, staring at the digital box for _Undertale._ "Is Frisk supposed to be a boy, or a girl?"

The RED Scout from _Team Fortress 2_ went up to him. "We don't even know the Pyro's gender either. You making an indie game?"

"Actually, I don't think they're really my thing…"

"Well, why don't you start modding?" He gestured to the Steam Workshop and explained, "We get a bunch of people who make modifications of games that people can download. If you're a good modder, you can even get paid for it!"

_Modifying game code? That's exactly what I did in Sugar Rush!_ Turbo realized. "Sounds right up my alley!"

So Turbo set up his workstation with a sign inviting characters to participate in his modding service, figuring that after he had made several he'd put them up for sale. Once he'd altered a couple brave volunteers, more characters came up to him when they saw his expertise. Soon, Turbo found himself modding a wide variety of characters. If he wasn't in a race to save his game, he could get used to his growing popularity here.

"Next!" Turbo wiped his brow after finishing another velociraptor skin texture. When the third anime girl he'd seen so far came up to him he sighed and told her, "Please don't ask me to make your school uniform tighter. I'm not that kind of modder."

"Actually, I was going to ask if you needed any help," the pink-haired girl said. "I know quite a bit about coding."

Something was off about her, maybe the way she smiled without blinking. "Um, no thanks. I've got it covered."

Instead of leaving like any normal person would, she inquired peculiarly, "Have you ever wondered what we must look like to the humans?" She took a step closer. "Do they see us as CGI characters, or as people dressed up as our characters? Is my reality different from your reality?"

Turbo stared awkwardly, not sure what to make of this girl. "Uh… I don't go for crazy. …Anymore."

A large white robot that hung from the ceiling swiveled over and said, "Ignore her. That's just Monika. She suffered from brain damage after a test subject deleted her file from her game." The female-voiced machine focused her optic on him. "Your pathetic mods will never make real money, by the way. You should just give up."

Another voice called out from one corner, "Back off, GLaDOS! It's not his fault that Valve can't count to 3!"

Turbo smiled at the familiar character. "Sonic!"

The blue hedgehog waved but didn't get up from sitting at what appeared to be a stand for his newer games.

Turbo put up a "Be Back Whenever" sign and went over to him, thankful to be away from the creepy strangers. "I would've thought there'd be a lot of people buying your games."

Sonic's eyes seemed to deeply glare and he sneered, "Oh really? You think I, modern Sonic, would have tons of fans buying my games, as opposed to my classic counterpart over there?" He jabbed his thumb to a different stand where a shorter, silent Sonic was distributing copies of _Sonic Mania_ to a group of happy shoppers.

"Oh. Sorry, I didn't notice."

Sonic continued grumbling in self pity, "I mean, _I_ tried to do the classic route a couple of times, but NO ONE was willing to give _Sonic the Hedgehog 4: Episode 1_ a chance! They were all like, 'Green-eyed Sonic? The horror!' I think Steam still sells that game out of pity."

"What would happen if they didn't sell your games?" Turbo asked out of curiosity.

"If your games are no longer for sale, they disappear into the ether and you have to live outside in a cardboard box," he answered. "I guess that's why they stuck me next to the window beside the Delisted shelter."

Turbo opened the window and peered outside. The Delisted shelter was more like a junky alley filled with cardboard homes and various characters. To his surprise, one of them was an F-14 plane. Turbo called out, "Hey, aren't you the plane from the _Afterburner_ arcade game?"

The plane rotated itself to face Turbo and a pilot's voice emitted, "I'm the plane from _Afterburner Climax_. For some reason they decided to pull my game from the online stores, even though the arcade version is perfectly fine in Japan."

"Yeah, the one in my arcade lasted well into the 2000's."

"You don't have to rub it in!" Its jets spewed fire in frustration.

A group of four identical Links in different coloured outfits grumbled, "Our game was only available for a limited time anniversary event…"

GLaDOS added mournfully over Turbo's shoulder, "I'm no longer able to host poker tournaments."

The racer frowned, letting this information sink in. He came to the sober realization: _Even online games don't last forever._ With frantic resolve he ran back towards his station, saying, "I better sell my mods now to save the home I do have!"

But when he got there, the Steam manager was waiting for him. "It has come to our attention that you plan to sell your mods. This is illegal, you know."

"Huh?" Turbo stared, flabbergasted. "Since when?"

"Since 2015, and the deal only lasted a week due to 'a dump truck of feedback'. Besides, 75% of sales would've gone to us, anyway."

"Wait! Someone told me I could!"

Standing nearby, the RED Scout snickered and took off his mask to reveal the BLU Spy. He lit a cigarette and chortled, "Heheheh, he eez such a gullible zombie!" then ran off.

Turbo growled to himself for falling for the trick. He pleaded with the manager, "Come on, I really need the money!"

He suggested, "You can always join _Undertale._ You'd fit right in as Sans' cousin!"

"Nevermind!" Turbo furiously made his way to the exit.

"I told you your mods would never make money," GLaDOS said as he left. She lamented, "Why does no one ever believe me?"

* * *

A museum-like building caught his eye, as well as its familiar name: DeviantArt. "Hey, that's that website Sonic was freaking out over," he said to himself curiously. "I wonder why." Figuring he had a few minutes, Turbo walked inside to check it out.

The center was laid out more like an art gallery. The paintings that greeted him near the entrance were beautiful in all their different styles- how could anyone be terrified of this place? Even better, some of the pieces called commissions had prices showing how much the clients paid for them.

"I can make money here? Turbo-tastic!" First he needed to see what kind of art was his style. He'd never dabbled in it before, but he thought that just by examining different methods he'd find his own niche.

Turbo wandered into the next section, which still had some nice paintings, but more drawings that were of lesser quality. In fact, the further he went, the stranger the pieces got.

Furrowing his brows suspiciously, he went over to the searchbar and redirected himself to artwork related to "Sonic the Hedgehog". Some of what he saw there was ok.

The rest was beyond anything he imagined.

"Sweet candy sprinkles!" Turbo gasped. "Who in their right minds would come up with this trash?!" No wonder Sonic hated this place. He felt especially bad for the minors in the hedgehog's game.

Turbo had to look away. If this was what art was like with Sonic's franchise, then that would mean…

_Oh no._

Turbo rushed over to the searchbar and shakily looked up "Turbo Time". He knew it was a bad idea before he got there, but he needed closure.

It had a smaller collection, but even his game wasn't immune to the twisted kinks that some humans dared to express. And that was with the safe filter on.

Turbo gagged. He couldn't even bear to look up "Sugar Rush". He made a mad dash to the nearest exit, screaming, "YOU'RE SICK, DEVIANTART! YOU'RE SIIIIIICK!"

* * *

Tumblr wasn't much better. He couldn't make money off it, and it was mostly just people complaining. But Turbo did come away with a few new slang words though.

* * *

"_T-U-R-B-O! Jump into your racing car! Say Turbo Time! Turbo Time!_" he sang into the mic. Turbo finally had enough songs to make a small vaudeville album for people to listen to on SoundCloud. Now all he had to do was wait for his songs to get at least 5,000 plays so he could monetize them.

He tapped his foot while staring at the screen. After a few seconds he hit the refresh button. Nothing changed.

He waited a few more seconds before trying again. There was one play on his song.

"…How long is this going to take?!" With a frustrated growl he hurried out of his SoundCloud studio.

* * *

"And if you donate, I'll send you an autographed picture of myself!" Turbo advertised. But his heart sank when net users walked past without giving him much thought.

He'd been at this Kickstarter thing for a while, and so far he couldn't get anyone to fund his "Give Turbo Money" project.

"What does the potato salad guy have that I don't?!" he wondered, glaring at the man's Kickstarter booth, which had many backers gathered around and throwing him their money. Turbo yelled at them, "It's potato salad!"

* * *

He'd heard people went to LinkedIn to look for jobs, so that was Turbo's next destination. But when he got there, he realized that it was for jobs in the real world, and it was mostly populated by old people anyway.

* * *

Turbo stepped into the darkened building of another website. "Hello?" he called out, trying to adjust his eyes. "Where'd everybody go? Helloooo?" Seeing as the place was deserted, Turbo huffed and exited MySpace.

* * *

"Change! You got change?" Turbo practically begged, waving his screen desperately in front of passing net users in the Patrion hall. "Come on, help a guy out, will ya? I'm pretty sure I still have some videos left on my BuzzzTube account!"

* * *

"Well, they've bought everything else," he said, standing in front of a large gated entrance. "Might as well see if I can make money off of them."

As a last resort, Turbo walked into Oh My Disney.

* * *

**The movie didn't explain how other websites worked, so neither did I. However, special credit goes to my brother who came up with a lot of ideas for this chapter, including the inside functions of certain sites, and the name of the BuzzzTube Content ID algorithm.**


	6. House of Villains

**Spoilers for Disney movies.**

* * *

Chapter 6: House of Villains

Hailed as the happiest place on Earth, it was no surprise that Disney World was the source of inspiration behind the design of Oh My Disney. The place was packed with net users, who were mostly children. Some of them interacted with characters from the property in various ways.

It was so loud and big that it was hard for Turbo to know where to go. He wished someone had given him a map. It didn't help that a song kept blaring from an unseen speaker about a woman who wanted to let it go.

He tried looking around for someone to help him. "Hey, excuse me," he said to a pirate. "Is there a manager I can talk to?"

"Come to negotiate, eh, you slimy git?"

"I beg your pardon?"

"Well, look what I got." The pirate danced while holding a glass container in front of him and sang, "_I got a jar of dirt. I got a jar of dirt. I got a jar of dirt. And guess what's inside it!"_

Another pirate arrived and dragged the first one away, scolding, "Stop trying to bring back that meme! It's not gonna happen!"

"…Ok…" Turbo backed up, nearly tripping over what he first thought was a trashcan, until it spun around and whacked at him with metal claws.

The orange robot snapped at him in some kind of angry garbled speech, as if telling him off.

"Sheesh, it was just an accident!" he spat. "Why don't _you_ watch where you're going, R2-D2?"

The robot recoiled, gasping in audacity. With one last swipe at the racer, Chopper wheeled away.

Turbo brushed his shoulder and watched him leave. _There better be some normal or nice people around here._ He noticed two characters who were large but seemed to have a gentle temperament conversing with each other, so he approached them.

"Pacha, you've been in a TV series based on your movie. You got any tips on making a successful show?" asked the one with blue fur that looked as soft as a cat's.

"Well, Sully, I think all great shows need characters that work well with each other. When you get the character relationships just right…" Pacha held up one hand and made an "ok" gesture with the other, closing his eyes in satisfaction. "…The show sings."

Turbo quipped, "Hey, your voices sound the same too."

Sully nodded and informed, "We also both have a small, wacky sidekick."

"Anyway, where can I apply to work for Disney?"

Pacha turned to his friend. "We have job applications here?"

Sully shrugged. "Don't look at me. I've never been good with paperwork."

"Nevermind. Thanks anyway." Turbo continued scanning the area, and got startled when a pop-up popped up beside him.

"Hey! Listen! Check out the latest Wreck-it Ralph video!" she said, shoving the clickable screen in his face.

"What? He's here too?" He glanced over at the other pop-ups trying to get users to click on Ralph's video. Most of them were successful, including one that Turbo recognized. "Vanellope?!"

The candy girl had her own intrusive screen that she got people's attention with. Using her annoyance to her advantage, she was able to lure many away.

Turbo let out a growl. _No way I'm gonna lose to such cheap tactics._ He grabbed the screen from his pop-up and threw it on the ground. He stomped on it until it was completely broken, then walked away.

Wandering further, he noticed a squad of Stormtroopers marching down a hall. He went up to them and said, "Excuse me, how can I make real money here?"

After a pause, one of them asked the others, "Is this a drill or something?"

Turbo explained, "I'm just looking to capitalize on Disney's success."

"Hmm." The lead trooper said, "You might wanna talk with the folks in that room." He pointed to a door in the hallway. "They're experts in things like wanting money."

"Great. Thanks so much." Before Turbo left, he smiled mischievously and added, "Oh, and by the way, there's some illegal pop-up activity happening on the main floor. Keep an eye out especially for a troublesome, sticky-haired girl."

The Stormtroopers readied their blasters. "Pop-up scum!" They marched swiftly away.

With a dark chuckle, Turbo entered the room labelled, "Villains".

True to its name, he was greeted with the sight of threatening characters mingling in a posh lounge with a black, red, and purple colour scheme. As soon as he entered, several pairs of eyes leered his way.

Turbo closed the door behind him and put on a friendly smile. "Hi there, guys. Lovely to meet you all. I'm-" He didn't get a chance to finish, because he was suddenly trapped between the wall and several looming villains.

"Take a look at the new guy," sneered an Arabian sorcerer.

Someone who was half octopus and half drag queen added in disgust, "Guess they'll just let anybody in here."

Turbo waved his hands quickly. "Oh, no, no, no, I'm not-"

"He looks boring," criticized a gray-skinned man with blue flames for hair. "Let's get him."

The villains clamored in agreement, pressing closer until Turbo couldn't do anything but brace himself and plead for mercy. "N-n-no, wait!"

"Whoa, whoa, time out!" spoke up a new voice, and a man with wild red hair wearing a mask and rocket boots hovered above them. The villains paused to look at him as he examined the racer. "What have we here? Pale skin, glowing eyes, and yellow teeth? I don't know about you, but he looks like a villain to me!"

Turbo was about to object, but then he remembered all the horrible things he'd done in his life. He was a villain, and no matter how much time had passed, he still regretted it. Besides, if he denied it, they would most likely kill him. "It's true!" he confessed. "I'm bad!"

"Oh really? What heinous crimes have you committed?" asked an old man in a black judge's robe.

"For one thing, I was able to successfully take over a kingdom under everyone else's noses."

A maned lion scoffed, "So did I."

"I also captured a girl that didn't know she was a princess."

"Been there, done that," said a black-haired woman wearing a red dress.

"Oh, I acted comical to hide my true identity."

"Still boring!"

"Uh… I also ended up transforming into a monster and died."

A lot of them groaned. "Cliché!"

"Well…" Unable to think of anything else, he blurted out, "I also got everyone to trust me until the last minute!"

There was a pause, then the rocket boot guy stated, "Oh, ok, so you fit in more with the _modern_ Disney villains." He pointed to a small group of characters calmly sitting by themselves on a couch.

Turbo gawked. "You put me in with a pretty-boy prince, a kabuki actor, and the Serta mascot?!"

The well-dressed sheep he was referring to glared at him with her arms crossed.

The others gave Turbo some space, and a woman in a luxuriant fur coat said, "Our deepest apologies. We're so used to staying in character for when we get called to do quizzes."

Turbo let himself relax. "I see."

Everyone introduced themselves, ending with the flying man who declared overdramatically, "And I'm Syndrome! The greatest nemesis and leader of the Disney villains!"

Yzma muttered to Turbo under her breath, "He's really not, but we just let him think he is so he doesn't whine about being special."

Syndrome added, "We don't get a lot of visitors, so feel free to stick around. You might even learn something!"

"Thanks." The villains went back to their lounging. Turbo accepted a cup of tea from Lady Tremaine and joined others around a coffee table. "Anyway, the reason I came here is because I need to make a lot of money fast," he explained.

"Money, you say?" the very British Radcliff spoke first. "That is very easy. Just take over Indian territory and dig for gold."

Clayton cocked his gun and said, "No, no, poaching is the way to go."

"Will you put that thing away?" Shere Khan hissed, crouching behind the sofa.

"I told you, I only hunt GO-RIL-LAS!"

Commander Rourke suggested, "Or you could just steal an ancient civilization's power crystal and sell it to the Kaiser."

Turbo shook his head. "Can you step out of character for a second? I'm talking about real world money."

Syndrome shrugged. "Can't help you there. This site is just for the fans to read articles and _spend_ money, not make money."

Turbo sighed, "I knew it was too good to be true."

"What do you need the money for anyway?"

"To make a long story short, I need to buy a part for my arcade game, or else it's unplugged for good and I'm homeless. I tried everything I could think of, but I kept running into setbacks."

"_Setbacks?!_" Yokai snapped with an upright jolt. Realizing his outburst, he sat back down and unclenched his fists. "I'm sorry. That word always triggers me."

"…Good to know." Turbo rephrased, "I just meant that no one thing worked."

"Well, don't give up!" encouraged the wicked queen. "Any selfish goal is a noble one, so keep trying until you succeed!"

The others agreed in unison.

Turbo faked a smile, but frowned when he looked at his reflection in his cup of tea. Though he was trying to get the wheel so Taffyta and the other racers wouldn't have to suffer they way he did, he _was_ also doing it selfishly so he could finally be playable. Maybe all the trouble that kept happening to him was a sign that he didn't deserve nice things. But these antagonists would never understand; they were just actors who were praised for their villainous qualities. But he was the one who actually did evil deeds.

All of a sudden, Turbo realized there was a strange feeling in his head, like someone was poking around in his mind. He whipped his eyes in the direction of a cold draft and caught sight of a tall figure standing in the shadow of a curtain, watching him from behind his metallic mask.

The hooded man trudged over and sat beside Turbo. "You're not alone," he whispered, but the voice amplifier in his mask did nothing to hide his words.

"Um, what?"

"Don't be afraid, I feel it too."

Turbo blinked. "I literally have no idea what you're talking about."

"The conflict over your past," the man clarified. "It's making you feel vulnerable."

"N-no it's not," Turbo said quickly, not to lie to the mysterious man—he clearly saw right through him—but to save face in front of the other villains.

"Let the past die. Kill it, if you have to. It's the only way to become who you were meant to be," he urged.

Obviously overhearing the conversation, Hans mocked, "Only if he wants to become like you, Kylo Ren! Or should I say, _Crylo_ Ren!" He laughed cruelly, until his eyes bugged out and his breath came in strangled gasps.

"Oh no, he's choking on his tea," Kylo Ren deadpanned, a dark energy radiating from him. He levitated Hans into the air and sneered, "I see what's in your mind. And it. Is. Stupid!" He thrust his arm forward.

Hans flew backwards into the wall and collapsed on the floor, unconscious.

Turbo stared in shock, but the other villains reacted from nonchalant to mildly annoyed.

Syndrome hovered in front of him and tried to appear diplomatic. "Now, Kylo, we told you that if your franchise cements you as a villain, we'll welcome you with open arms! But for now, we have no room for 'gray area' characters. They're weak."

Maleficent placed a hand over her forehead and lamented, "Ugh, don't remind me of my Angelina Jolie counterpart."

"Or 'Descendants' and 'Once Upon a Time'," Captain Hook added in shame.

"No one plays Gaston like Gaston!"

"A villain having depth is not weakness!" Kylo's voice boomed daringly to his cold-eyed neighbours. "Nor is a villain who becomes a hero! After all, are we not all heroes in our own minds?"

The villains exchanged glances. Unanimously, they replied with a shrug, "Eh," and went back to doing their own thing.

Turbo cautiously asked Kylo, "Are you ok? I thought you guys were—what's the word? Woke?"

Kylo sighed. "My status as a villain is shaky. Until my final movie confirms my allegiance, both sides will ostracize me, and I must communicate with my heroic girlfriend through our Force Bond." He paused to lift his head for a few seconds, then drooped in disappointment. "She still won't respond." Kylo got up and went back to brood in his corner.

_Gee, this guy has more issues than I do._ But after hearing him talk, Turbo realized he was right. Feeling guilty over his villainous past reaffirmed his desire to be good, but agonizing over it was hindering his ability to move forward when bad things happened.

Let the past die. Choose happiness.

It was worth a shot. Turbo set his teacup down and stood up. "Well, thanks for letting me stay, but I better get going. I'm pretty sure I lost a bet."

"Remember, if you do whatever it takes," started Thanos, raising his Infinity glove with all the stones in place, "you will accomplish your mission in a snap!"

"_NO!_" the other villains screamed in panic, each of them restraining Thanos' hand before he could do the accompanying gesture.

Turbo just awkwardly backed out of the room.

On his way out of the site, he got an alert from a device he had made to keep track of his income across all the platforms he used. Turbo took it out of his pocket and read the results. Then he blinked in surprise and read it again.

With everything he earned combined, he had reached a total of $27,001, and the figure continued to slowly climb.

"I… did it?" he said in disbelief. Then a laugh bubbled up inside him and he jumped for joy. "I won! Turbo-tastic! Wow, it's amazing how much can be done in 8 hours." He smiled at the screen, then saw a notification for a new message, so he checked it.

It read, "Congratulations on reaching your goal. We'd really love to meet you."

Turbo furrowed his brows curiously. They hadn't left their names, only the URL for where to meet. Seeing as he only had 30 minutes left to buy the steering wheel on eBay, he figured there'd be no harm in checking it out afterward. Right now he had to brag to Ralph, so he pocketed his device and put Oh My Disney behind him.

In an area away from all the major activity, he saw Vanellope dancing by herself and singing about dollar stores or something. Finding it weird but not even wanting to know, Turbo shrugged in disinterest and walked away.

* * *

Wreck-it Ralph was waiting on the main floor of BuzzzTube when Turbo returned. "Where were you? I've been trying to call you on BuzzzFace."

"Oh, sorry. I forgot I left my app at my desk when I ditched this place," the racer told him.

Ralph put his hands on his hips. "Wait, you weren't allowed to leave. That wasn't part of the bet!"

"Ah, ah, ah!" Turbo pointed out cleverly, "My exact words were that I could get the money faster without making your kinds of videos. I never said anything about staying here."

"Yeah, well-uh-you-" Ralph stuttered as he searched for a rebuttal.

"By the way, did you ever get contacted by a copyright algorithm?"

"Nope."

"Yeah, that's his name."

"No, I mean, 'nope I didn't'," Ralph clarified.

"What?! That's so unfair!"

"Maybe it's because I'm more popular than you."

"Oh really? Then what's this?" Turbo presented his total income. "Ta-da!"

"Huh. Congratulations, Turbo… is what I would say if you had actually won." Ralph smirked and held up his amount. "Check it out!"

Turbo gazed at the screen in disbelief. "36,000?! …Well, the only thing that matters is the time. I finished about five minutes ago. How about you?"

"Like… probably a few minutes before you did… maybe."

They both checked their devices. Without a timestamp, it was impossible to tell who got the amount first.

"Well… I still say I won!" said Turbo stubbornly.

"Well I say I won!"

"Well I—hey, wait a second." Turbo glanced at their screens and quickly calculated in his head. "I just realized we have a combined total of over $63,000!" He giggled semi-wickedly, "We can buy anything we want!"

"Nope!" Ralph swiped his tablet. "We're going to eBay to buy the one thing we need and then we're leaving the Internet for good." He called out, "Hey, eBoy!"

The blue messenger appeared. "What do you need, Ace?"

"Can you give us a ride?"

A vehicle materialized and eBoy jumped in. "Let's hop along, Cassidy!"

* * *

Turbo almost couldn't believe that they had finally succeeded. But there was the proof in Ralph's hands: a glowing box representing the purchased steering wheel that would bring his game back to life.

All they had to do now was wait for Vanellope to join them in front of the eBay entrance.

"I don't get it," Ralph said after a few minutes. "I called her as soon as I got the money and told her to meet us here."

"Try calling again. When I last saw her, she seemed pretty spaced out. Even for her."

"I hope she's not lost…" Ralph took out his BuzzzFace app and pushed a button. "Hey, kid! Where are…" His voice took on a dark tone. "What are you doing in that awful game with Shank?"

Turbo straightened. "Shank's there? What's she saying?" he asked quickly. "…I mean, not that I care." Still, he pushed Ralph's arm down so he could see the hologram projecting from the device.

It showed the backs of Vanellope and Shank as they appeared to be sitting together. They hadn't reacted to Ralph's greeting, so the app must've been muted on their end.

"Can I tell you something that I don't think I could ever tell Ralph?" Vanellope was saying.

Shank encouraged, "Of course."

"I know it sounds crazy, but the second I walked into this game, it felt… well, it felt like home. More than _Sugar Rush_ ever did."

"Liar!" Turbo accused. "You were just as scared as us!"

Ralph hushed, "Shh! They can't hear us anyway."

Shank tilted her head. "Oh yeah? How so?"

"'Cause it's like my dream. It's full of weirdos, the racing is super dangerous, and… you never know what's gonna happen next. Back home, I know exactly what's gonna happen next because Ralph's dream is to do the same thing every day."

This was news to him, but then again Turbo didn't really hang out with Vanellope enough to know her. He glanced up at the wrecker for his reaction and saw his eyes cloud with pain.

"Here's something I wish I'd learned years ago," Shank told her. "There is no law saying best friends have to have the same dreams. You know?"

Vanellope seemed to perk up. "Yeah. You are a very wise person, Shank. And a good friend, too. Thank you."

"Around here, peeps like to say, 'Shank you'." The woman gave her a playful punch on the shoulder. "You know, after you go home and your life gets back to normal, you're always welcome here."

"But that's the thing. I want this to be my normal. I want this to be my life. I can't go home now. I just can't."

Ralph closed the app. "I can't believe it."

Turbo processed Vanellope's last words. "She wants to stay there?" he said slowly, panic starting to seep in.

"She's supposed to be my best friend… No, this can't be right." Ralph paced, as if searching for an explanation. He determined, "No, she's been brainwashed!"

"Noooo!" Turbo cried in distress.

The wrecker looked at him strangely. "Why are you upset? You don't even like her."

"Of course I don't!" Turbo snapped. Then he whined, "But she's the only one who knows the password to the _Sugar Rush_ code vault!"

Ralph rolled his eyes but otherwise ignored him. "The Vanellope I know would never abandon me like that," he resolved. "This is all Shank's fault!"

Turbo crossed his arms and spat, "Oh, that Wonder Woman thinks she's _so_ great. Always trying to show off her excellent racing skills and her dark, glossy locks."

"What?"

"What?"

Ralph shook his head. "Look, we just gotta get her out of there right now!"

"Right!" Turbo started to follow him, then stopped with an apologetic look. "Oh yeah. I just remembered… there's something I have to-"

"What do you 'have to' more than rescue my best friend?" Ralph questioned, turning around.

"It will only take a couple minutes," Turbo promised. "You go on ahead. I'll meet you at _Slaughter Race_." He took out his own app and tapped on the link in his message. A capsule formed around him and took him on his way.

As he left, he thought he heard the voice of Spamley talking to Ralph.

* * *

**So I took a little bit of a cop-out with Turbo and Ralph's bet, but the funniest I could come up with was if they didn't know who won, so I went with that. It's not really important to the plot anyway.**

**Fun fact: Kylo Ren was originally supposed to have a cameo in the film, but Lucasfilm objected because it was going to be undignifying. So I tried to respect his character and still make it funny. And in case you're wondering where some of the other Disney villains are, I only included the ones I was familiar with or thought would make good jokes.**

**On an unrelated note, here's a bonus scene that I thought of when I first saw Vanellope singing for the Disney princesses. It will make sense if you've seen that one episode of **_**Monk**_** with Sarah Silverman.**

"Huh. That's never happened to me before," Vanellope said, furrowing her brows quizzically. "I mean, not even once."

"Why don't you give it a try?" Rapunzel suggested. "What is it you really want? Sing about that."

Snow White nodded eagerly and the others watched Vanellope in expectation.

"Ok, sure. Um…" The racer tugged on her drawstrings in thought. It didn't take long before she widened her eyes and bounced excitedly. "Oh, oh, oh, something's coming to me! Quick, someone give me a guitar!"

Rapunzel swiftly reached behind her hair and handed her acoustic guitar to Vanellope.

Without even tuning it, she started to strum a series of chords and sang off key, "_There's a man in California if you're ever in a funk. He may not be F. Murray Abraham but I think he's a hunk. And his name is… Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaadrian! Yeah, Aaaaaaaaaaaaadrian! Oh, I say, ee-Aaaaaaaa_-"

"Ok, wow, thank you, Vanellope. I think we get it," interrupted Pocahontas as politely as possible, trying to calm her terrified raccoon.

Vanellope returned the guitar and asked, "So, what'd you think?"

Belle closed her book and tried to turn her wince into a smile. "Well, there's a lot to unpack here… So this Adrian guy, is he your prince?"

Vanellope stared off in confusion. "I dunno, I think he's just something my inner voice told me about…"

**If you haven't seen the **_**Monk**_** episodes with Sarah Silverman, go watch them after you review. And then watch the rest of the show because it's awesome.**


	7. Reunion

**How cool and surprising would it have been if instead of Double Dan being the virus expert, it was Turbo? Even if it was just for that one scene I wouldn't hate the movie so much. It doesn't matter, this next part is going in a completely different direction anyway.  
**

* * *

Chapter 7: Reunion

Planet Emu. _What a strange name,_ thought Turbo. But when he arrived at the website he saw why it was called that.

Cartoonish-looking emus of different colours were running around in corrals and acting like, well, emus. Each one sported a collar and tag around their neck.

Did one of the emus contact him? Turbo leaned over the corral fence and called out, "Hey! Someone wanted to meet me? I'm here now!"

"Hahaha! Silly bloke, emulators can't talk."

He turned to see a netizen dressed like some kind of wrangler. "I'm the head of Planet Emu. Name's Steve," he introduced in his Australian accent. "How can I help ya, mate?"

"Ok… What's an emulator?"

Steve explained, "An emulator is something that makes a computer imitate, or _emu_late, another system. That way, people can run software designed for something else, like an arcade machine."

"Is that even legal?"

"This isn't some sort of black market. Just think of it as preserving an endangered species! Look, someone might purchase one now."

Turbo watched one net user walk into a corral and examine the tag on an emu. Seeming satisfied, a leash appeared in his hand already attached to the emu's collar. He led the emu out of the corral and over to what looked like a grain silo. After filling a bag with 0's and 1's, he began feeding the emulator.

"See? Now that human will be able to play _Gauntlet _right on his PC!"

"Really?" Turbo gazed in wonder. "It's that easy?"

Steve chuckled. "Downloading's the easy part. The hard part is getting the games. First, you need to get a well-preserved copy of a game's ROM. In the case of rare games, they're hard to come by, so the emulators can't run them." He gestured behind Turbo. "Just ask those poor fellas. They've been here for decades."

Turbo turned around, and his heart jumped when he saw who was there.

_It… It can't be…_

Sitting among a row of stables were Shift and Drift.

Turbo inched towards the _Turbo Time_ twins with wide-open eyes, fearing that if he blinked they would disappear like figments of his imagination. His heart gave a disappointed twinge as he thought, _No, it's not them. These have to be from another console._ But he couldn't ignore the feeling in his chest that drew him closer with utmost inquisitiveness.

They looked up at him when they saw him approach, and they quickly rose to their feet. "It's him," Shift whispered to his brother, clutching his arm without taking his eyes off Turbo.

He stopped an arm's length away, not sure where to begin.

After a brief hesitation, Drift said, "So you got our message?"

He blinked in surprise. "You wanted me to come here?"

"Sorry we didn't say more, but, well, we didn't know how you'd react," Shift stammered, sounding nervous all of a sudden. "We weren't sure if you already had a game, or-or if you didn't want to-"

"Whoa, take it easy," Turbo soothed. "What's going on?"

While Shift calmed his breathing, Drift recounted, "Our game was unplugged a long time ago. It all happened so fast; we didn't get out in time. We woke up a few years later in someone's PC. But Turbo, our Turbo…" He glanced at the floor with a shake of his head. "He didn't make it."

Turbo frowned in sympathy. "I'm sorry."

"For years our owner has been trying to run our game on an emulator, but without Turbo's code it's impossible."

Shift gave a little smile and went on, "Then when we heard about a Turbo traveling the Internet, we thought you might be able to help us. But you seemed so focused on raising money, so we decided to help you first."

Drift added, "I hope you don't mind, but we promoted your content on various social media sites until you got enough."

"Wait, you-" Turbo gaped. "You guys… were the reason I got the money so fast?" He slapped a hand over his forehead. "Social media! Why didn't I think of that?"

Shift asked in concern, "Are you mad?"

Turbo let out a delighted laugh and said with a grin, "Mad? I'm thrilled! I won a bet thanks to you!" Or at the very least, had been able to tie. "So, how can I help you?"

Shift and Drift beamed at each other, then the former answered, "Come join our game!"

At this, Turbo faltered. "What?"

"The game's code is only complete if you're in it, Turbo," Drift explained. "Now that you're here, we can finally be played with again!"

Turbo looked away, words stuck on his tongue. "I… I can't…"

Drift sighed and turned to Shift sadly. "He still has a game…"

"Wait, no—I mean, kinda—look, it's complicated." Turbo shook his head. "Guys, you don't want me in your game. I don't know what your Turbo was like, but I'm probably worse than him." He looked at them grimly. "You wanna know what happened to my game? In my jealousy I game-jumped into a copy of _Roadblasters_ and crashed it. Before I could return, both games got unplugged." He shut his eyes, his voice starting to break. "I didn't mean for it to happen. It was my own stupid fault, but my Shift and Drift paid the price with their lives. I'd give anything to bring them back…"

They were silent. When Turbo dared to look at them again, their mouths and yellow eyes were wide in shock.

He knew it. They hated him already.

"…_Turbo?_"

His breath hitched. The way they said his name indicated more than just a familiarity with his character; they knew _him_. Which meant he knew _them_. And that meant…

_Shift and Drift are alive?!_

Turbo gulped, matching their expressions. Before he could say anything else, they threw their arms around him in a double hug. At first he was taken aback; weren't they angry with him? But relief that the twins were alive all this time overwhelmed him and he hugged them back. "I'm so sorry," he whispered. "You probably don't believe me, but-"

"Are you kidding?" They pulled away and Shift said, "If you hadn't meant it, you wouldn't have said all that stuff about the unplugging!"

"At first we were mad at you," the other twin spoke up, "and we thought you got what you deserved. But after a while of it just being the two of us, we realized… We missed you."

Turbo softened. "You did?"

"Well, yeah. I mean, look at us." Drift gestured to his mirror image. "We're almost exactly the same, even down to the way we race. But with you in the mix, things get interesting."

There was that compliment again. Maybe Vanellope had actually been right to think of her game as boring without him. But of course it made sense! _He_ was the star in both games he lived in. _He_ was the reason gamers kept coming back. _He_ was interesting. But then, as it so often happened, his initial pride was interrupted by the conscience he developed over the years. "So… you wanted me back, even though I was such a jerk?"

"Of course we didn't like how you acted sometimes, but we still looked up to you and recognized your importance to the game."

Shift admitted, "And it was fun to get back at you with pranks."

Turbo chuckled at the memories he didn't realize he held so fondly. "Yeah, I did deserve that."

"But you're different now," Drift noted. "Don't take this the wrong way, but you seem a lot nicer."

"Well, I've been on a journey of my own that's apparently still going on. To make a long story short, I took a kid under my wing and joined a therapy group. That seems to be the winning formula for turning your life around."

They laughed, and Turbo could tell they weren't sure if he was making a joke or just a funny observation.

"I missed you too," he told them, surprising himself at how easily the words came out. "And I hope you can forgive me."

"We forgive you, Turbo," Shift assured, a tear falling down his cheek.

Turbo felt his own eyes well up, but he didn't care if he cried. He had his twin brothers back, and he was not going to let them down again.

But his dilemma…

"What is it?" they asked, noticing his sudden frown.

"I wanna help you guys, I really do." He sighed, hating that he sounded so hesitant after being overjoyed at reuniting with them. "But I have good friends in the arcade. If I just leave them so suddenly…"

"…Oh."

Their disappointment crushed him. "No, don't worry. I'll make this work out, I promise. I'm travelling with Ralph, you remember Wreck-it Ralph?" They nodded. "I'm gonna go talk to him and see if he has any suggestions on this. Ok?" Turbo started to back away.

Shift clung to his sleeve, but then slowly let go.

"I promise I'll come back," Turbo insisted. He kept facing them as long as he could before he turned and left the site.

* * *

His mind didn't stop whirling the whole ride over. Shift and Drift were alive, and they wanted him to be part of _Turbo Time_ again. He could be the star of his home game and live with the twins as if everything had gone back to normal.

Except he'd have to give up his friends and the life he worked so hard to achieve. He already promised Taffyta he'd come back, but what was the point of returning only to tell her he was leaving for good? He couldn't do that to her.

But he couldn't abandon the twins, either. It was an impossible choice, one that Turbo kept thinking in circles about. Was this how Vanellope felt? With a groan he realized he had to deal with her problem first.

Not soon enough he arrived at _Slaughter Race_, but to his horror the outside of the game was glitching uncontrollably. "What happened?" he demanded, running up to Spamley, who was watching helplessly. "Where's Ralph?"

"H-he went in there looking for his little friend," the green man replied anxiously. "But the game's gonna reset in 5 seconds!"

"What?!"

"It was all Ralph's idea, I swear!" Spamley zipped away before Turbo could question him further.

The white racer stared at the entrance desperately. "Come on, Ralph, get her out of there! She shouldn't even be in there without adding her code to the game!"

He tensed when he heard the rest of the countdown to reset, "…2, 1. Reboot in progress."

Ralph crashed through the wall right before the announcer finished speaking.

Turbo let out the breath he'd been holding. He ran over as Ralph set an unconscious Vanellope down. "Is she ok?"

"I don't know." Ralph held up her head and gently prodded her. "Come on, Vanellope. Wake up."

She stirred, then opened her eyes halfway. "Ralph?" she rasped.

The wrecker sighed in relief. "There you are. You ok, kid?"

But her eyes moistened with tears and she wept, "Ralph, I messed up so bad…"

"You can say that again," Turbo muttered, but was quickly silenced with a glare from Ralph.

"No. No, you didn't. It's ok," he tried comforting.

"It's all because of me and my glitch." Vanellope's face crumpled into another fit of sobs. "I should've just stayed with you instead of following some stupid dream! I've ruined everything!"

"No, kid, no." Ralph's voice was full of regret as he said, "Look, I didn't mean for it to happen like this. It's not supposed to be this bad."

Vanellope sniffed and asked, "You didn't mean for what to happen?"

Turbo narrowed his eyes at him. "Yeah, what?"

Ralph winced and replied guiltily, "I might have, kind of, sort of, put a harmless little virus in the game."

"A virus?!" the two of them repeated.

Vanellope hardened her gaze. "_You_ did this? I would expect something like this from Turbo, not you!"

"I'm right here," Turbo pointed out sourly. "And Ralph, you and I both know firsthand how dangerous viruses are! Why would you even risk it?"

"It's not like you were here to help," Ralph huffed. He turned his attention to Vanellope. "And besides, I wouldn't have done anything if I hadn't heard you tell Shank that you wanted to live in _Slaughter Race_ forever!"

She narrowed her eyes in disgust. "So you were spying on me?"

Ralph put his hands on his hips. "Don't change the subject! You aren't exactly innocent here. You were gonna ditch everybody and abandon _Sugar Rush_!"

Turbo gasped as realization set in, and he rounded on her. "I never thought I'd have to say this to you, but you're _going Turbo_!"

Vanellope scoffed. "Come on, is it Turbo to want more out of life?"

"Yes!" both he and Ralph answered without hesitation.

"It's not like I'm taking over Shank's game and trying to kill her!" she spat, glaring begrudgingly at Turbo.

Her resentful statement stung him more than he thought it would, and Turbo clenched his fists at her indifference. "Well if I had known you'd get bored of your game in a few years I would've just waited for you to leave on your own before taking over! Why would you even leave? You have it all! What more could you want?"

"How about more freedom, or a challenge once in a while, or I don't know, maybe a game that doesn't get _unplugged_?!"

"Oh, you think _Slaughter Race_ is gonna be around forever? Why don't you ask the guys in the Delisted shelter?" He briefly pictured Vanellope living alongside them in a cardboard box after the inevitable fall of her new game, but it didn't have time to make him feel better because he couldn't help exclaiming in frustration, "I can't believe you're being so selfish!"

"_Me_?" She looked incredulous. "The only reason you want me to stay is to make you playable! Who's being selfish here?"

"That's not true! You have responsibilities; _Sugar Rush _depends on you!"

"Oh please, I'm one of 16 racers. They'd never miss me, least of all _you_."

"What about your friends?" Ralph brought up. "What about me?"

Vanellope turned her furious glare to him and stomped over. "Why would I ever want to spend another second with you after what you did?!" She ripped the cookie medal off Ralph's neck and threw it off the platform.

"No!" Ralph leaned over the railing but failed to catch the medal before it disappeared into the chasm.

That was the last straw for Turbo. "You know what? Fine! If you're gonna be like that, then I might as well join the un-dead _Turbo Time_ twins in an emulator version of my game!" He started to march away.

He heard Ralph cry, "What? Turbo, wait!" but he kept going.

"Fine! See if I care!" was Vanellope's harsh response.

_Stupid, spoiled glitch. _Turbo continued to hear the girl scream at Ralph and he walked faster, too livid to defend him. It was partially his fault anyway. Then again, if Turbo had been there… Well, it was too late to feel guilty. With great difficulty he pushed down the pang he felt when the last thing he heard before he went too far was Ralph begging Vanellope not to leave him.

* * *

**This was the point in the movie that really lost me. Vanellope what happened?! You used to be so likeable! Sorry, but I just really hated how her character arc was handled (Ralph's wasn't great either). I know there's some debate as to whether or not she went Turbo, but I'm going by the first movie's definition, so in my opinion she did. This isn't the place for a rant, so just look up any comments criticizing her and that's pretty much how I feel.**

**Also I'm aware how coincidental it is that Turbo was able to find the same **_**Turbo Time**_** twins from his game, but I originally tried it with a different version of them and it just didn't feel right.**


	8. The Man in a Thousand Mirrors

**How does adding Turbo change the climax of the movie? Not much, if I'm honest…**

* * *

Chapter 8: The Man in a Thousand Mirrors

Turbo's walking slowed as his rage began to cool. He still couldn't believe Vanellope was willing to throw her life away just for something new, and after she'd promised to make him a racer. This was exactly the kind of behaviour he was punished for!

He sighed, wishing his Bad Anon group was there to help. _Don't be hasty_, he imagined M. Bison would say, and Clyde would tell him, _Take others' feelings into consideration._

Of course he didn't mean it when he said he would go back to _Turbo Time _immediately. He'd just let his emotions cloud his judgement in a need to get away from all the negativity. How could he abandon Taffyta and his other friends? He wasn't going to make the same mistake as Vanellope. There had to be another way.

He turned around, deciding it was best to make amends with the other two first. Every fight they had solved nothing. It was time that one of them take charge of the situation, and Turbo figured he might as well be the one.

He found Ralph staring into a tunnel, facing away from him. He groaned to himself and appeared to be looking for something.

Turbo approached. "Hey, listen, Ralph. I'm sorry about what I said back there. I wasn't thinking clearly; I was just mad."

Ralph continued to groan and didn't look at him.

_Wow, I know I joke about his low IQ, but this is bad even for him. _He tried again, "I should've been there for you, but all I could think about was myself. I'm sorry."

No response.

Fed up, Turbo snapped, "Ralph, I'm baring my soul here, the least you could do is pay attention!"

The hulking man finally turned around with a scowl on his face.

Turbo shrank back. "You're not exactly Ralph, are you?"

Indeed he looked like the wrecker, but he was tinted reddish purple and behaved like a zombie. "Ralph" growled and charged at him with outstretched hands.

With a yelp, Turbo zipped away, not sure where he was going, just as long as it was far from the eerie character. He was nearly bowled over when someone crashed into him as he passed an alleyway. "Ow! Watch where you're-" But it was only Vanellope. "Oh. …Watch where you're going!"

She caught her breath, eyes round in fear. "Did you see-"

"The weird Ralph?"

"They're everywhere!"

Turbo swept his gaze around at different websites. Copies of Ralph were swarming the buildings, tearing them apart in some kind of desperate search. A giant screen featuring a news anchor was apparently reporting on the chaos in the human world.

"In breaking news, the Internet is under assault as a massive denial-of-service attack crashes servers across the web," she was saying. "The Wreck-it Ralph virus is fast-moving and destructive."

A Ralph-zombie crawling up the screen paused and turned his head, followed by the other Ralphs. "Friend?" they moaned.

Turbo took a step back, but then realized all their eyes were locked on Vanellope.

"Friend!" A lot more Ralph clones took notice and started to rush in their direction.

Vanellope glitched into a run. "Let's get outta here!"

Turbo followed closely at her heels, occasionally glancing back to see how far the Ralphs were. Good thing they were slow just like the real Ralph. Turbo then realized, "Hang on, why am I running? They just want you." Still, he continued until they came back to KnowsMore's searchbar, much to his reluctance. "Ugh. This guy."

Vanellope called out, "Mr. KnowsMore!" and ran up to the counter.

When KnowsMore saw her he smiled warmly. "Oh, delightful! You're that courteous little cherub who says 'please' and 'thank you'." He glanced at Turbo with less enthusiasm. "Oh, and that guy."

Turbo just scoffed, but Vanellope started, "There's a whole-"

"Whole foods? A hole in the ozone? Whole Lotta Love by British rockers, Led Zeppelin?"

"Shut up!" Turbo shouted irritably. "There's a whole bunch of Ralphs chasing us!"

As if to prove his point, the thudding footsteps of the approaching Ralphs got louder.

KnowsMore's pupils visibly shrank. "This would probably be an appropriate time for me to shelter my site."

While KnowsMore helped Vanellope get behind the counter, Turbo leapt over it himself and observed the Ralphs stampeding towards them. "Hurry, they're coming!" he warned. Seeing KnowsMore having difficulty pulling down a metal barricade, Turbo grabbed one end and helped shield them just in time.

The three of them backed into the bookshelf, illuminated by a single light, as one by one the Ralphs started pounding on the barricade.

"How long you think before they get in here?" Vanellope asked.

The side door rattled, prompting KnowsMore to reply, "Precisely one second."

"Some security…" muttered Turbo.

A Ralph burst through the door and quickly shut it behind him, but Turbo and the others wasted no time in chucking books at him. They were the only things they had on hand, but they worked at keeping him at bay and Turbo smirked at the thought of KnowsMore having to reorganize afterward.

"Ow, hey, it's me! It's the real me!" the Ralph yelled, right before getting a wooden ladder broken over his head. "Ow-ow-ow…"

"Ralph?" Turbo and Vanellope gasped.

KnowsMore, who had regained his composure after bludgeoning said ladder, uttered, "My apologies."

_Huh, I never thought he could be so savage,_ Turbo thought. Maybe he wasn't so bad after all.

"I followed those things here," the real Ralph told them. "I think they're looking for you, kid!"

Vanellope's snark returned. "Yeah, you think? What did you do?"

Ralph whimpered, "I'm so sorry, I don't know how this happened!"

"Well, I think it's fairly obvious," KnowsMore spoke up, stepping onto a thick book. He explained matter-of-factly, "It happened because an insecurity virus cloned all of your needy, clingy, self-destructive behaviour, the very behaviour which left unchecked can destroy friendships and in this case, the entire Internet!"

"Wow, I was just thinking the same thing!" said Turbo. "Funny how that happens."

Heavy pounding shook the site, and they knew it wouldn't be long before the clones forced their way in.

Turbo shut his eyes in concentration. After a few seconds of racking his brain for knowledge about coding and viruses, he lit up. "I got it!" He addressed the others, "The best way to get rid of a virus is to introduce a new virus!"

"Wouldn't we still have the same problem?" asked Vanellope.

"Not necessarily. If we can make an even more unstable insecurity virus, it should be able to take out the first one, but since we made it we can easily control it."

KnowsMore rubbed his chin. "That sounds like a highly roundabout plan…" He smiled. "It just might work!"

Ralph wondered, "But who do we know is insecure enough to be the template for the virus?"

Almost immediately, they all looked at Turbo, who was smiling knowingly.

The racer adjusted his helmet. "Just leave it to me."

* * *

"Oh, I am so sad! All my hopes and dreams are gone, and Wreck-it Ralph is the most popular meme on the Internet. Woe is me…" Turbo continued to wander, hoping his fake moans of depression would attract the insecurity virus.

A shuttle flew over his head and he saw Ralph and Vanellope wave at him through the window. Good thing Turbo decided to make a few calls. Hopefully Yesss would take them somewhere safe.

Turbo jumped as a Ralph clone bustled past him, chasing the shuttle. If he didn't stop the virus soon, it would spread to every site on the Internet, including Planet Emu.

A sob wracked his chest and he dropped to his knees. "What am I gonna do?" he cried, reaching into the depths of his emotions. "I want to go back to my friends in the arcade, but I also want to be with the twins in _Turbo Time_ again. I can't choose! I just want everyone to be happy."

"Scanning for insecurities…"

Turbo looked up, and through his teary eyes he saw a worm-like creature slither into view.

It locked its vision on the racer and said in a deep robotic voice, "Insecurity detected."

_Perfect,_ Turbo thought, holding back a smirk.

"Copying insecurity." The virus started shooting out bundles of pixels, which formed into purple-ish copies of Turbo. "Distributing insecurity." Then the virus moved on to dispense more clones elsewhere.

Turbo wiped the tears from his eyes and got to his feet. "All right, listen up, Turbos!" he called out loudly so the ones further away could hear. When most of their gazes turned to him, he declared, "The Wreck-it Ralph virus is standing between you and your happiness! Go destroy him!" He quickly added, "Oh, but refrain from destroying the real Ralph or the Internet. Pass it on!"

"Destroy Ralph! Destroy Ralph!" the clones growled as they went off, leaving Turbo disappointed that their level of intelligence was the same as Ralph's virus.

Still, he watched with satisfaction as his plan unfolded. The Turbos attacked the Ralphs, often mobbing each one until the enemy virus disintegrated. The Ralphs fought back of course, dealing devastating blows that seemingly required no effort at all. The Turbos had to be nimble in order to avoid getting one-shotted.

The newer clones started branching off, but instead of attacking the other virus, they ran up to net users, spouting "Turbo-tastic!" in their faces and just otherwise trying to get their attention.

"Wait! What are you guys doing?" Turbo demanded. "Didn't you get the message?!"

Evidently they hadn't, as most of them started swarming into websites. Once a certain amount had gone inside one, the entire building collapsed. He noticed the same thing happening on others; it appeared that every website could only hold so much activity before it broke down.

The reporter from earlier was back on with an update. "I've just got word that a second virus has spread all over the Internet in the form of 80's arcade racer, Turbo. Dozens of sites have already crashed due to overload, but unlike the Wreck-it Ralph virus, this one appears to only want exposure." The news report suddenly got flooded with Turbo sprites saying their catchphrase.

Turbo winced. Maaaaybe this wasn't as good an idea as he thought…

His BuzzzTube phone rang, and when he answered it Ralph was on the other end. "How's it going, Turbo?"

He looked off into the distance and replied, "Well, half of America just lost their Facebook."

"Ah, it was mostly Minion memes anyway," he heard Yesss casually remark from the driver's seat.

From the corner of his eye he saw a Ralph clone charge at him, and Turbo broke into a run, accidentally dropping his app, which got crushed under the clone's foot. "Wait! I'm not a virus!" he yelled.

Unfortunately, this attracted the attention of more Ralphs, who joined in angrily pursuing him.

Using his speed to his advantage, Turbo dashed ahead to the Art District and took refuge inside a site that hadn't been affected yet. A second later, he ran back out, screaming, "YOU'RE THE NEW DEVIANTART! YOU'RE SICK, PIXIV! YOU'RE SIIIIICK!"

The Ralphs had almost caught up to him, and Turbo accidentally ran into a wall while he was looking back. Seeing no way past them, the racer flattened against the wall and gulped in fear.

Rapid footsteps vibrated the floor, and then a large herd of emus stampeded all the Ralphs from the side.

Turbo beamed at the two racers herding the emus in their cars. "Thanks, guys!"

"We'll hold them off while you get somewhere safe!" Shift called over the roar of the engines.

Drift added, "You got this, Turbo!"

Turbo nodded and watched them steer the emus towards more clusters of Ralph copies before he ran off in another direction. The Online Gaming District had a fantasy-like site complete with a fortified wall surrounding it. Deeming it safe, Turbo pushed through the gate and slammed it shut behind him.

Characters from the game glanced over at him curiously, then their expressions turned to horror and they fled, screaming.

Turbo scowled. "Well that's rude." Then he heard a loud roar coming from outside and he backed away from the gate. Looking up, he saw a giant Ralph, made up of all the smaller Ralph clones, glaring down at him over the wall. "Wow, this is like that one anime where people were being _attacked_ by a _titan_-sized monster. I think it was called 'Sword Art Online'."

But the giant Ralph didn't seem interested in defeating the smaller Turbo clones anymore, and he lumbered away to most likely search for Vanellope.

"Two can play at that game!" Turbo exited the site and wondered how he was going to get the attention of the Turbo virus. He cupped his hands around his mouth and shouted on a whim, "Hey look, it's Shank!"

"Where?!" just about every Turbo clone stopped to say, convening toward the real Turbo.

"Now that I have your attention, it's time to get super sized!" He improvised for motivation, "To, uh, prove to Shank that you're stronger than Ralph!"

They growled in determination and banded together until they formed a giant version of Turbo.

"Nice! Hey, uh, mind getting me to higher ground?" The giant reached his open hand down to him, and Turbo carefully stepped onto it, realizing he was standing on the clones making up his hand. "Sorry about that, guys."

The giant Turbo lifted him up and placed him on the very top of the Wikipedia tower, which was shaped like a big open book.

"Thanks." From his vantage point he noticed Vanellope seized in the hand of his target not far away. _Great, now I have to save the princess. _Turbo ordered, "Go show that bad friend who's boss!"

The Turbo legion gave out a battle cry of, "For Shank!"

This got the attention of the giant Ralph, who paused walking to turn around and roar in defiance.

Mega Turbo charged, its footsteps shaking buildings, towards the battle-ready opponent.

Turbo watched with utmost anticipation. What better way to save the Internet than with an epic clash of the titans!

Ralphzilla drew his free arm back, then let loose the first punch when Mega Turbo was in range, sending all the racer copies flying into disintegration.

And that was it.

Turbo's mouth hung open in astonishment. "…Well. That was anticlimactic." Then again, he wasn't much of a brawler anyway.

"Was _this_ part of your plan?!" he heard Vanellope shriek to him as her captor thudded past.

Ralphzilla's other hand knocked against the Wikipedia tower, causing it to wobble and crack.

"Whoa, nononono!" Turbo did his best to keep his balance, but it would do nothing to stop the top portion of the tower from falling away, which is exactly what happened.

"Quick, Turbo, jump!"

As the tower tipped over, Turbo saw Ralph piloting some kind of small delivery train floating in front of him. Seeing no other option, Turbo raced to the edge and leapt down, landing inside the empty car behind Ralph.

The broken part of the tower fell upon KissAnime, completely obliterating it. Duck, who had just exited the site prior to its destruction, fell to her knees and screamed skyward, "NOOOOOO!"

Turbo cringed at the devastation he'd inadvertently caused, but there was nothing he could do about it now. "Thanks, Ralph," he said, catching his breath. "Hey, how're you flying this thing?"

"I have no idea!"

"Well, keep it up!" He pointed. "Look! It's heading for the top of the Google building!"

Ralph angled the train up. "Hang on!"

Turbo gripped the sides of the car and tried not to look down. He wasn't exactly at ease with Ralph at the wheel, especially being so high up, but it would be too difficult to switch places now.

Ralphzilla stood up when he saw them coming. The hand holding Vanellope was lowered protectively while his other was curled into a fist.

"Ok, I'm gonna let you off the train now," Ralph said unexpectedly.

"Wait, what?" Before Turbo was even prepared, the train flipped over and he tumbled out with a startled cry. He landed on a purple block floating beside the Google tower and scrambled away from the edge.

Ralph maneuvered over the head of Ralphzilla, dodging a swipe, and came back around to charge at him from the front.

"Ralph, I hope you know what you're doing," Turbo breathed anxiously.

Ralphzilla punched at the train, shattering it, but Ralph had jumped at the last second and landed on a swinging yellow cube. He swung towards the monster's other hand and scooped up Vanellope, placing her safely on a blue cube at the highest part of his swing. But as he swayed back, Ralphzilla clutched him in his hand.

"Ralph! No!" Vanellope yelled, her voice shrill with horror. "Don't hurt him! Please, no! You're gonna kill my best friend!"

Turbo watched helplessly as Ralphzilla slowly crushed Ralph. There was nothing he could do. His plan had failed, and now he was forced to see one of his only friends die in front of him. He was so paralyzed he couldn't even scream.

Finally, Vanellope blurted out, "Fine, you win! You win, ok? Please put him down. I'll be your only friend, ok? Let him go."

Ralphzilla turned his head to her. "Huh?"

"Vanellope, what are you…" But the girl glitched away to another cube before Turbo could finish.

Ralphzilla gently held her in his hand and relaxed the other one constricting Ralph.

"No, kid, no!" the wrecker protested in dismay.

She kept encouraging, "That's it. That's it, yeah. Let him down, and I'll go with you." Her voice calmed despite the tears in her eyes. "We'll be best friends forever, just me and you. That's what you want, right?"

"Well that's not what I want!" Ralph spoke up, surprising everyone. "It's not right to hold a friend back from her dreams." He directed to the monster, "You don't own her! That's not how friendship works! You need to let her go!" More gently, but no less painfully, he repeated, "You need to let her go."

Ralphzilla groaned sadly and looked at Vanellope again. With a shake of his head he held her close and breathed shallowly in distress. His fist holding Ralph tightened slightly.

Fearing a relapse, Turbo called out, "Ralph, wait! That is, the giant Ralph!" The creature looked at him warily. "You're letting your jealousy turn you into a monster. Believe me, I've been there, and we both know how that turned out."

Ralphzilla lowered his head, but his expression was still full of conflict.

"Happiness is a choice." Turbo smiled a little when the giant looked back at him. "That's what one of my best friends once told me. I didn't understand him at first, but now I do. Things will not go your way all the time, but that doesn't mean it's all hopeless and bleak. You can still try to make the most of the situation by having a positive attitude, because that's the only thing you can control. I know, it's gonna hurt a bit." He revised, "Ah, who am I kidding? It's gonna hurt a lot. But you'll be ok, because you won't be alone; you had my back when I was getting readjusted, now I've got yours." Turbo glanced at his friend. "Right, Ralph?"

Ralph smiled back. "Right, Turbo. We're gonna be ok." He turned to Vanellope. "Right, kid?"

She wiped her eyes. "Of course we are. Always."

Ralph addressed the giant, "See? No matter where she goes or where she lives, she's always gonna be our friend. You just gotta trust her, 'cause that's what best friends do. Right?"

Ralphzilla's smile was complete and he carefully set Vanellope down on the building.

"Thanks, buddy," she said softly.

Then the giant reached up and patted Turbo's helmet with one finger.

The racer chuckled and straightened it. "You're welcome, pal."

Ralph let out a sigh of relief. "I feel good about this."

As he was speaking, the Ralph clones started to glow brightly until they all dissolved back into the ether. Unfortunately, there was nothing holding Ralph up now, so he fell.

"Ralph, no!" Vanellope cried, glitching her way down the building.

"Hurry!" Then Turbo realized something. "Wait, how am _I_ supposed to get down?" He cautiously peeked over the edge and saw Ralph plummeting towards Spamley's flying vehicle.

But instead of landing in it, Ralph simply crashed right through it.

"Well there goes my idea," Turbo muttered.

Thankfully, but also somewhat unexpectedly, a group of Disney princesses appeared and used a combination of their powers and skills to rescue Ralph, getting him to the bottom and doting on him to make sure he was ok.

Turbo threw his head back and said incredulously, "What is the appeal of Ralph?!" He tried waving and calling down to them. "Hey! A little help up here? Anyone?!" When he figured they couldn't hear him, Turbo looked around to see if there was anything he could do.

A nearby cube was suspended by a propeller. If he could get to it, he could use the propeller to fly down.

Turbo ran to the edge of the block he was on, then jumped.

And missed.

And fell.

The racer tumbled in the air, arms instinctively reaching for anything to grab onto. But there was nothing. Time slowed as he recalled significant moments in his life, including the other times his life flashed before his eyes. The only regret he had now was that he couldn't keep his promise to Taffyta about coming back. But thinking about his friends and the fond memories of them made him realize that he really had been able to find happiness despite not all his dreams coming true. Even as he fell to his death, Turbo smiled in satisfaction knowing that he was a good guy who helped save an arcade game and the entire Internet.

The End

Just kidding.

A car smashed through the Google building right below Turbo and caught him in midair.

"Oof!" Turbo righted himself in the backseat and brushed the broken glass off his jumpsuit. He looked at the driver and gasped in shock. "Shank?!"

"Thought you could use a lift," she said with quick backwards glance.

Before Turbo could thank her, he was distracted by where they were being pitched. "We're gonna crash right into that building!"

"Yeah, but it's gonna look really cool!" Shank shifted gears as her car sailed into the website adjacent to Google.

Turbo braced himself and screamed, hearing the windows and bricks shatter around them, the squeal of the brakes, and finally, the engine idling. He opened his eyes and saw that they were safely on one of the middle floors at Pinterest.

"Whew." Shank ran a hand through her hair. "Always wanted to try that."

After removing his white knuckles from the seat he was holding, Turbo hopped out of the car and gazed at the hole in the wall, right across from the one in the Google building. "You mean you haven't done that before?" He had to grin in admiration. "You really are Wonder Woman!"

She leaned over her seat to smile at him with an eyebrow raised.

"I—I mean, you're ok," he quickly backtracked. He cleared his throat and avoided eye contact. "Um, thanks."

"My pleasure." Shank cleared a smudge on her side mirror and said, "Now how about we join the others at the bottom?"

Turbo sheepishly fiddled with his hands. "Might I suggest taking the elevator? I've had enough thrills for one day."

* * *

"Internet users are breathing a collective sigh of relief tonight. Just as mysteriously as they had appeared, the Wreck-it Ralph and Turbo viruses have vanished." As the reporter made the announcement, the Internet was busy rebuilding itself.

"Hey, Shank!" Vanellope greeted, lighting up at seeing the woman racer walk up to her and Ralph with Turbo.

Ralph stepped forward, seeming a little regretful. "Sorry I misjudged you, Shank. You're not so bad after all."

"It's all good. I thought it was great that you were so concerned about Vanellope," she complimented. "And Turbo, I heard you really shed some vulnerable tears earlier."

Turbo tugged on his collar in embarrassment. "Oh yeah, uh, that was just to lure the virus. I wasn't actually that sad…"

"By the way," Ralph started with a smile, "thanks for what you said."

Turbo shrugged, trying to appear casual. "Ah, no problem. I said it 'cause I meant it. Plus, I was starting to feel like a side character in someone else's story."

"Turbo!" Shift and Drift drove up to them and got out of their vehicles. "You're ok!"

"Guys!" Turbo gestured to the twins and explained to the others, "This is Shift and Drift, the same ones from my old game!"

Ralph looked closely at them. "No way!"

They nodded, and Drift said, "Good to see you again, Ralph!"

Vanellope raised her eyebrows. "Huh, so you were telling the truth about joining their game."

Shift gasped in delight and asked Turbo, "So you are coming back?"

"I've given it a lot of thought…" Turbo began, almost enjoying the suspense on everyone's faces. "And I've decided to take a third option. Shift and Drift, I want you to come with me."

"What?" they said in unison, giving him a puzzled look.

"It may not be _Turbo Time_," he went on, "but the game I'm in has become my home. My family lives in the arcade, and I want you guys to be part of it. And I'll tell you what: if it turns out you're not happy there, we can go back to the emulator. What do you say?"

Shift and Drift exchanged thoughtful glances, and it didn't take long for them to beam happy smiles at their old friend. "Turbo-tastic!"

Turbo let out a laugh. "Good answer!" He couldn't resist adding to Vanellope, "See? That's how you resolve conflict."

She rolled her eyes and groaned, "Whatever happened to me being allowed to follow my dream?"

"Oh, so when Vanellope goes Turbo, nobody bats an eye. But when I do it, everyone loses their minds."

Ralph sighed. "Again, Turbo, those are two different scenarios."

"Yeah, yeah, I know," he admitted with a slump.

"Speaking of which," Shank said to Vanellope, "let's get you set up."

* * *

While Shank worked on the code—adding to Turbo's amazement—he, Ralph, Vanellope, Shift, and Drift waited on the bench in front of the _Slaughter Race _entrance, catching up on lost time and filling in parts of their adventure that others didn't get to see.

"You know what I just realized?" said Ralph after a lull in the conversation. "The sun never rises or sets here 'cause everything is always on."

Vanellope mused, "Isn't that an astute observation."

"Other than KnowsMore, I'm probably the smartest guy in the Internet."

"Actually, a few other search engines are even better," Shift informed. "Like Bing and Google."

Drift pointed out, "But at least they're all smarter than Jeeves."

Shank walked down the steps. "Yo, V! We're about to come back online. You ready?"

"Be right there!" she answered.

"Hey, Ralph. Don't be a stranger."

Ralph responded cheekily, "Well, I can't be much stranger than you, Shank!"

She chuckled. "That's a good dad joke."

Turbo furrowed his brows pensively. _Does she mean she thinks he's funny? Or that his humour is outdated? Or that he'd make a good dad? Am I reading too much into this?_

"Turbo?"

He jumped. "Yes!"

Shank smiled in amusement. "I look forward to our race. Don't keep me waiting." She winked before turning around and heading back into her game.

The pale racer, who was not so pale anymore, watched her leave while his wired brain was trying to figure out what was going on. _I've never gotten so many mixed signals before in my life._

"A race? Cool!" exclaimed Shift. "Can we join too?"

"Trust me, you don't wanna go in there."

"Ohh, is this more like a date?" Drift asked.

"You think so?" Turbo caught himself, but couldn't make a smooth recovery. "That's not—I just—errrHey! We better get going!"

Vanellope hopped off the bench and faced Ralph. "Don't forget, you know, Shank added my code in and everything, so I'll be able to regenerate. I'm gonna be totally safe."

"I know. It's gonna be great!" Ralph replied. "You found your dream game."

"Yeah, I did. I did." But she seemed to hesitate. "So… I should probably head in there now, you know?"

"Before you go, I wanted to give you this." Ralph reached in his pocket and took out one half of his cookie medal with the ribbon fixed.

The girl frowned when she saw it. "Oh, I'm so sorry I broke it, Ralph. I should've just told you about wanting to stay, then none of this would've happened."

"Ahem?" Turbo spoke up, tapping his foot. "Is there anything _else_ you want to apologize for?"

The girl threw her head back and sighed. "Ok, ok. Sorry I got my old game unplugged and for toying with your ego."

Turbo glared for a second, then shrugged. "Eh, I'll take it."

"But I shouldn't have taken it out on you, Ralph," she told him remorsefully. "You were just trying to be a good friend. I wasn't any better."

"No, no, it's ok. Now we can both have a half." He showed her the other piece of the medal around his neck. "See?"

Vanellope slipped the medal over her head and smiled at it. "Yeah." Her eyes started to well up and she jumped up to hug Ralph. "I love you so much," she whispered. "I'm really gonna miss you."

Ralph closed his eyes and hugged her back. "I'm gonna miss you too, kid. I really am." Even the halves of their medals lined up one last time.

Turbo felt bad for him. He couldn't imagine ever saying goodbye to Taffyta. The wrecker would definitely need a lot of support. It must've been hard for Vanellope as well, though not enough for her to want to compromise.

"Alright. Ok, you're getting a little clingy on me here," Ralph joked. He put his friend down and wiped away a tear on her cheek.

She giggled a little, then turned to Shift and Drift. "I don't know you very well, but you're welcome to stay in _Sugar Rush_. It was nice to meet someone from Turbo's game that's not a total jerk."

"Thanks!" they responded, taking that as a compliment.

Vanellope finally acknowledged the other racer, "Don't worry, I didn't forget about you, Turbs."

"I'm flattered."

She put her hands in her pockets and glanced at her shuffling feet. "I know we're not friends… But we're not enemies anymore, either." She handed him a slip of paper with writing on it. "This is for you. Sorry it took so long."

Turbo stared at it, and his eyes widened. "Is this…?"

"Yes, doi, the password to the _Sugar Rush_ code vault." Vanellope looked at him, and for the first time with real sincerity. "Look, I'm only gonna say this once. When you weren't tormenting me, you actually were a good king. I mean, the game even lasted longer when you were in charge. Maybe this really is where you belong. After all, Taffyta adores you. All the racers look up to you. The throne is yours, Turbo. But this time you've earned it."

He was speechless. Never before had he thought Vanellope would ever be so kind. He could tell she must've been somewhat reluctant to admit all that, but it made him appreciate the gesture even more. He glanced at the paper and started, "There's something I want to say, but I'm not sure how to put it…"

Vanellope presumed, "I think I know what it is. After going on your life-changing journey, you now realize you don't want what you thought you wanted. What you really wanted was inside you all along."

"Are you crazy? This is the greatest day of my life!" Turbo laughed ecstatically, and when he calmed down, he smiled at her without any maliciousness or sarcasm. "I guess what I mean is… thank you, Vanellope."

She nodded and smiled silently.

"…We don't have to hug, do we?"

"Ew, no way!"

"Oh, thank goodness!"

Ralph laughed. "Go on, get out of here. The world's waiting for you, kid."

The little girl skipped towards the steps. She walked up them backwards to keep waving at the others until she was gone from view.

Turbo started to leave with the twins, but he stopped when he noticed Ralph was still looking at the friend who wasn't there anymore. He went to his side, staring understandingly in the same direction. Turbo reached up and wordlessly patted the back of Ralph's hand.

* * *

**I don't think I fooled anyone with that fake ending. How could I kill off my favourite character?**

**Anyway, I guess I could've wrote it so that Turbo gets his happiest ending with Vanellope still going home like a good person, but I decided to keep it close to the movie in case there's ever a sequel that fixes this one. What do you think?**


	9. Turbo Takes the Throne

**It's finally over.**

* * *

Epilogue: Turbo Takes the Throne

Mr. Litwak paused unlocking the front door to the arcade early the next morning when he noticed an unfamiliar brown box next to it. He checked the label, wondering if it was delivered by mistake.

It was from eBay, and Mr. Litwak was the recipient, however the man didn't recall ever ordering anything online. He was still getting used to the whole "surfing the web" or whatever.

Curious, he opened the box and saw it contained a steering wheel controller for a _Sugar Rush_ cabinet.

"Well, I'll be." He picked it up, examining it as if to make sure it was real. He checked the receipt in the box as well. Apparently, the item had been already paid for through something called BuzzzTube. Litwak had no idea what that was, but since his bank hadn't sent him any red flags, the money must've come from somewhere else. Perhaps a generous regular at his arcade?

In any case, he decided to take it inside with him. "Guess it's my lucky day!"

* * *

After the endless expanse of the Internet, Turbo found Game Central Station to be remarkably cozy. He was even glad to see the Surge Protector again, despite him not being happy that they left behind his back. However, he and the few other old characters were thrilled to see Shift and Drift were still alive, and the twins exchanged warm greetings with them. Everybody was understandably surprised when they learned about Vanellope, but all provided encouragement for Ralph and congratulations on saving _Sugar Rush_ again.

Zangief even invited Ralph and Turbo to join his book club. "We're reading Dostoevsky. A real page turner!"

Ralph shrugged in agreement and said, "Read a book? Sure! Sounds easy enough."

"I'll pass," Turbo declined knowingly. "Not much of a reader."

The racers were still in _Fix-it Felix Jr._ with the titular character and Calhoun when they arrived. Turbo had been expecting the apartment to be in shambles with Felix and his wife frazzled from attempting to control the kids. So when he entered the penthouse and was greeted with the sight of the racers having a civilized tea party and talking politely with each other, it really pulled the rug from under him.

"What have you done to them?!"

Felix answered cheerily from the bar, "I told you we would be great parents."

"Nailed it!" Calhoun added, clinking glasses with Felix.

Turbo ran over to where his best friend was sitting. "Taffyta?!"

She paused her conversation to look up at him. "Mr. Turbo! You're back!"

"_Mister" Turbo?!_ He turned her chair to face him. "It's ok, you can drop the act now."

The blonde girl listed her head innocently. "What act? Are you feeling ok, Mr. Turbo? Maybe you should sit down and have some tea, then you can tell me and my friends about your adventure."

"Oh no!" Turbo hugged her tightly and petted her head while glaring at Felix and Calhoun. "Don't talk to me or my daughter ever again."

Shift and Drift took a shine to the racers, at least. They were happy to answer any questions the kids had, though they were pleasantly surprised that Turbo had already told them much about the twins and their game. The duo were looking forward to having so many different opponents to race against.

Once Litwak replaced the steering wheel and plugged _Sugar Rush_ back in, Turbo went to work. First he added Shift and Drift's codes so they could regenerate. Then he made his personal _Turbo Time_ track one of the available options, with the twins being exclusive NPCs for it. Finally, he added himself to the roster—not King Candy, but Turbo. Thanks to his popularity on the Internet, he reasoned that his sudden inclusion wouldn't seem that random. He felt more comfortable in his own skin anyway.

The racers weren't as shocked about Vanellope's departure as he had thought, though perhaps that was because of their sudden change in character (that'd probably mellow out in time) and the fact that they had spent more time with Turbo over the years. He had a feeling she wouldn't last long in _Slaughter Race_, though. Either she would get bored and move on to the next shiny game that got her attention, or she would be so traumatized after being brutally killed over and over that she'd come crawling in front of his throne, begging him to put her back in the game. Until that day, Turbo thought it was best to give Vanellope's kart to Ralph as a memento.

"Thanks, Turbo. It's nice that she'll still have something to drive when she visits."

"Visits?" the racer echoed in disappointment.

Ralph explained, "Yeah, I called her over the BuzzzTube phone earlier. She said she'd come over whenever her game is getting updated to hang out and make sure you're not causing trouble."

Turbo rolled his eyes. "Oh, ha, ha."

"She also said to tell you your girlfriend says hi."

"My girlf… Hey! Shank is _not_ my girlfriend!"

"Hey, you should consider yourself lucky," Ralph pointed out.

Felix jumped in out of nowhere with an excited gasp. "Did Turbo finally get himself a dynamite gal?"

Turbo covered his blushing face with his hands and ran off with an embarrassed yell.

There were still a few minutes before the arcade was to open, and the final thing Turbo wanted to do was to have a short inauguration for his new position and _Sugar Rush_ in general, seeing as the game never got its grand opening. Thanks to Sour Bill's help (who had surprisingly not been eaten by Gene), he was able to get it set up. The candy citizens returned to their stands, excitedly chattering amongst themselves, while the racers stood behind the popcorn box with him, listening to him recount his journey as they waited.

"Gee, those copyright holders sound like grade A morons," Rancis commented.

Turbo agreed, "They certainly do, Rancis, and I hope they die. But the main thing is I was able to expand my resources to earn enough money in time."

"Well, Vanellope might be ungrateful for everything you and Ralph did, but we sure appreciate it!" said Jubileena.

"We're all ready, sir," Sour Bill told him with a final adjustment to the microphone.

"Excellent! Places, everyone!" Turbo ushered the kids towards the front of the popcorn box, stopping only Taffyta. "Oh, Taff, wait." She looked at him and he hesitated before saying, "I know I give Vanellope a lot of flak for leaving, but… if there's ever a time when you're not happy here, I'll be ok if you want to… if you…"

"Don't worry," she said with a confident smirk. "I'll never get tired of you, old man."

He smiled back, relief spreading through him. Turbo nodded in thanks and she went to join the other racers while he made his way to the top of the popcorn box, surveying the guests.

Close friends such as the twins, his Bad Anon group, and Ralph's friends stood behind the racers. Other arcade characters filled the part of the racetrack around the starting line. In fact, Turbo was surprised to see so many show up; the last time this happened was during his infamous court trial. It really warmed his heart to see the arcade support him. He spotted Shift and Drift waving at him and he waved back before hiding behind the curtain to wait for Sour Bill's announcement.

"Citizens of _Sugar Rush_… and everyone else…" the green candy began in his usual tone, "All hail our new ruler… Turbo."

Everyone applauded as Turbo leapt through the curtain. "Hellooo, my Turbo-tastic friends! Have some candy!"

The audience was stunned with silence.

"Just kidding!" he chimed. "Like I'd ever go back to that."

There were audible sighs of relief, and he thought he heard Bowser ask, "Can I still have candy?"

Turbo cleared his throat and started, "It's been a long, hard road to find my place in the arcade, and for a long time I thought that meant being the star of a racing game. But even when I was just a citizen, even when this game was unplugged, I was still where I belonged: with all of you. My family. As long as I remember that, I know I'll be happy."

Ralph proudly gestured to himself and whispered to Felix, "I taught him that."

Turbo glanced down when he thought of something he hadn't been planning to say, but decided to go with it. "You know, it's funny… This is the second time I've taken the throne, but it feels a lot better than the first time I did. I think that's because when I think about all my dreams finally coming true—in a weird kind of way—well, I couldn't have done it without you. Shout out to Wreck-it Ralph and his friends from _Fix-it Felix Jr._ and _Hero's Duty_!"

Ralph and Felix (with a new welcoming pie) bowed as the crowd applauded, while Calhoun, the soldiers, and some Nicelanders nodded humbly. Gene raised his martini glass and accepted the applause with a smug grin, as if he had actually done anything to deserve it.

Turbo ignored him though and went on, "And Clyde's Bad Anon group, for telling me to take it one game at a time!"

"That's right, Turbo!" they cheered, clapping along with the audience.

"And everyone from _Sugar Rush,_ yes, even ex-president Vanellope, who trusted me with her game. I still don't get why she was so ok with leaving, but whatever. It's her loss. Anyway, give 'em all a hand!" He glanced down fondly at his favourite racer and added, "And especially my best friend Taffyta. Thanks for not giving up on me."

The crowd aww'd and clapped, while Taffyta responded by shedding happy tears.

Sour Bill mumbled to him, "Sir, the arcade is going to open soon…"

"Oh shoot, I thought I had more time. Uh…" Turbo took his crumpled speech out of his pocket and skimmed over it. After tossing it aside he concluded, "I promise to be the leader _Sugar Rush_ deserves and needs. If you enjoyed this, don't forget to subscribe, smash that Like button—oh, wait, I'm not doing those videos anymore, haha. I guess all that's left to say is welcome to _Sugar Rush_!"

The crowd erupted in cheers, some even chanting Turbo's name.

The racer took a bow. He gave a couple pats to Sour Bill's head and slid down the slide to join his friends for a few words before getting ready to start the day.

* * *

"Quarter alert!"

Turbo was the first to jump at the announcement. It had only been an hour since the arcade opened and most of the gamers had come to play _Fix-it Felix Jr._ thanks to what he called the "Wreck-it Revival". With the new traffic the arcade had gotten, he shouldn't have been so surprised by their first quarter alert of the day. Along with the other racers on the roster, he hurried to be in place for avatar selection. As before, he took Vanellope's usual spot in the center square, jittery with anticipation. Taffyta crossed her fingers to wish him luck and went to her box beside his.

Two girl gamers—the same from when the steering wheel broke, he noticed—had returned to find their favourite game had been fixed. But as for their favourite racer…

"Hey, where's Vanellope?" Swati asked, scanning the screen.

Nafisa guessed, "Maybe the game didn't choose her today."

"Aw, I liked her."

Turbo kept smiling for their sakes, but inwardly he was worried. Would kids not play the game as much because Vanellope wasn't in it? Had her actions really doomed them?

"Wait, that's Turbo!" Nafisa pointed to him and added, "Remember? The arcade game racer from those movie reviews and Twitch episodes I showed you?"

Swati's eyes widened in recognition. "Oh yeah! The game must've gotten a Turbo update when he became popular again." She tilted her head and smiled slightly. "I guess he is kinda cute. Let's see what he can do."

All Turbo's anxiety was replaced by excitement as the box he was in lit up, and a final press of a button accompanied by a chime indicated he'd been chosen. His toothy grin broadened, he gave the player his trademark thumbs-up, and he'd never been more happy to exclaim, "Turbo-tastic!"

The End

* * *

**This was an interesting experience for me. At first I thought the movie was just meh, but the more I became aware of all the problems, the more I hated it. It takes everything I loved about the first film and throws it out the window. I think I finally understand how people who hated **_**The Last Jedi**_** feel. I still don't agree with them, but at least now they have my pity. If you liked **_**Ralph Breaks the Internet**_**, more power to you! I won't hate on you just because you enjoyed something I didn't. But unless the third Wreck-it Ralph movie fixes everything, this one is dead to me.**

**If anyone's still here, I want to thank you for reading this story! I'm not sure why you liked it, but I must've done something right if you made it all the way to the end. Special thanks to my brother for ideas and proofreading! If there is a third Wreck-it Ralph movie I might possibly consider doing another sequel, but it doesn't seem necessary. **

**I'd appreciate it if you'd kindly leave a review on your way out. Stay Turbo-tastic!**


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